


Hold Me Down

by ifinkufreaky



Series: Hold Me Down [1]
Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Abusive Relationship, Acrophobia, BDSM, Bad BDSM Etiquette, Blood, Breathplay, Choking, Cutting, Discipline, Dubious Consent, F/M, Knifeplay, Pain, Spanking, ivar is not a role model, neither is Sigrunn, not the self harm kind, shitty consent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-05
Updated: 2017-03-01
Packaged: 2018-09-15 02:32:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 27,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9214925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifinkufreaky/pseuds/ifinkufreaky
Summary: OC Sigrunn is King Harald's daughter, staying as a hostage in Aslaug's household to insure the Lothbroks against treachery. Our cruel little Ivar finds ways to take advantage of her situation, but may find himself deep in something more real than he expected. Set during episode 4x12.Character insert aside, this an AU in which everything is the same except that the mid-season-four time jump lasted however long it takes to get Ivar up past the age of legal consent in your country. Y’all get me? This story depicts an abusive relationship with predatory sexual behaviors, nonexplicit consent, erotic pain, and has trigger warnings for blood and cutting (not the self-harm kind). This is a fantasy; I would never tolerate this type of abuse in real life and neither should you.





	1. we meet again

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, the title is from the Halsey song.

The last time my father brought me to Kattegat, the sons of Ragnar Lothbrok had all been boys, save for Bjorn, who had left with the men on their raid of Paris. I, the daughter of King Harald, was to stay in the home of Queen Aslaug as an “honored guest” until they returned. I knew even at the tender age of eight what that really meant. My father’s ambitions to become King of all Norway were no secret, and I was to remain amongst Ragnar’s family as a hostage while the fighting men embarked. A deterrent against any potential treachery.

I remember being struck almost blind by Queen Aslaug’s beauty and grace, daughter of the legendary heroes. There was no doubt in my mind she carried giant’s blood and wielded any number of magical powers. My childish self wished to do anything that might please her, to find any way to become more like her. One way I knew I could get her to look on me with a smile was to be kind to her youngest son, Ivar. He was petulant, selfish, and cruel, but I attended to his needs and played with him when no one else would, all to earn the affection of a queen who was only one step away from goddess in my eyes.

Little Ivar learned quickly that he had my loyalty, though he seemed ignorant of its source. When he realized I wasn’t going to tell on him, he did nasty things to me when no one was looking, biting me so hard I would bruise, pulling my hair until I begged him for mercy. I hated it but always found some way to forgive him. The queen helped me in that regard, praising me for noticing how special Ivar was, and for indulging his “tempers” with such grace.

In the years that passed after Father and Uncle returned from Paris and I rejoined my family at Vestfold, I was able to allow myself to hate Ivar and the way he treated me, and to let go of my childish worship of Aslaug. I had grown into a graceful and tall young woman myself by the time Father informed me that we were returning to Kattegat, this time so he could join Bjorn Lothbrok in a grand journey to a distant southern sea.

My father had made no hostile moves on Ragnar’s domain in all these years, even though the king himself was mysteriously absent, and yet my presence as a hostage was apparently still required. I thought I was ready to put the past behind me; none of us were children now. Certainly I could keep to myself this time around, bow politely to Queen Aslaug and stay out of Ivar’s way.

*****

I had not reckoned on Ivar the Boneless growing into such a handsome young man. Whatever plans I had were shattered when he laid those intense blue eyes, so like his mythic father’s, upon me as my family interrupted his feast. My father greeted his older brothers first, insulting the young prince. As for me, standing demurely behind my father and uncle, all plans to remain cold and distant were lost when Ivar’s mouth twisted in a wide, devilish smile, so like his mother’s, and he called my name over the noise of the crowd.

“Is that Sigrunn? Come here and embrace your old friend!” he cried, cheerful but with a churlish undertone. It seemed that his eyes were gleaming with cruel intent already, fresh off my father’s snubbing of him. I held my breath as I approached him. I swept my golden hair over one shoulder, bent down to smile and press my cheek against his. But it had been almost ten years; perhaps he had forgotten his little games.

Ivar’s arms snaked around me in a surprisingly strong embrace, pulling me off-balance and steadying me against himself all at once. “Have you missed me, pet?” he whispered in my ear. It wasn’t the most humiliating of the names he used to call me. He pulled back before I could respond. “Mother, look at what a beauty our Sigrunn has become,” he said, resting one hand with proprietary familiarity on the small of my back as he turned me to greet Queen Aslaug, seated beside him.

The queen had not aged a day since I had seen her last. My resolution to believe there was nothing magical about her faltered when her tilted eyes warmed at the sight of me. Meeting her gaze set my head spinning as it always had, and I dropped my eyes and made a tiny bow, acknowledging our small difference in rank. “Indeed, she has,” Aslaug said to Ivar, an odd tinge of amusement in her voice. “It will be wonderful to see so fair a face brightening our table each day in the coming months.”

“There is nothing I look forward to more,” Ivar responded. He waved a serving girl over. “Have a drink, Princess, sit beside me here.”

My father was already halfway across the room. “In a moment, perhaps,” I said politely, “but first I must give my greetings to your brothers, and the other guests…” I trailed off as Ivar’s hand closed over my wrist, halting my retreat.

“One drink,” he said, staring intently into my eyes, menace poorly hidden under a twisted smile. “You can talk with my brothers later.”

I couldn’t quite suppress my shudder. This version of Prince Ivar was infinitely more frightening than the petulant child he had grown from. There was a strength, and cunning, giving weight to his threats that had not been there before. And yet the kind of power that he exuded was already drawing me to him, hypnotizing me like he had learned some of his mother’s magic. I wanted to walk away and I wanted to find some excuse to run my hand down his angled cheekbone at the same time. Curse whatever gods made him this handsome.

“I must at least greet your father, King Ragnar. I do not wish to give him insult,” I said, bowing my head and smiling politely as I slipped my hand from his grip. I twisted away and worked hard to keep from running back to my father’s side.

As I continued making greetings around the room with my family, I felt Ivar’s piercing blue eyes following me. He laughed loudly and joked with the guests that came to speak with him, but always his eyes were veering back in my direction. Ignoring him and assuming he had forgotten me had been my only plan for surviving this summer, and it was already clear that was not going to be the way of things.

*****

My father was only gone a few days when Ivar first caught me alone. It was something I had been expecting after all the long, calculating looks and weirdly promising smiles he had been giving me when we passed each other in the Great Hall or dined with the family in the evenings.

When last I was here, I had spent most of my time with the youngest prince, hadn’t forged many bonds with the girls of the court. As children we had all been grouped together, but now we were adults and the rhythms of the Hall kept men and women largely separate. It felt odd, at first; I almost missed him. I had to carve out a new place for myself at Kattegat now.

The ranking women of Aslaug’s court, myself included, had spent the evening at embroidery, and I had volunteered to tidy up and organize the supplies after all the others turned in for the night. I was standing alone near the dying embers of the central fire when I saw Ivar crawling down the hall to me. I knew it might anger him if I stared, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the lithe way his arms flowed as he dragged his functionless legs behind him. There was a grace and power in the way he moved his body that I found incredibly alluring.

I feared his anger but Ivar’s mouth twisted into a smile when he caught me looking, like he knew I was admiring him.

He pulled himself up to take a seat on one of the benches near the fire.

“You’ve been avoiding me, little Princess,” he said, eyes fixing on me like a cat spotting a mouse. “We’re not like we used to be. You used to love me. I don’t think you love me anymore.”

I knew I had to be very careful in my response. Ivar’s temper was always a dry pile of twigs, ready to ignite at even the slightest spark. “I go where Queen Aslaug wishes me,” I said, inclining my head slightly. “She is my hostess. Or should I say jailor.”

Ivar smirked at me from his perch. “I didn’t understand that about you when last you were here. It came to me later, that you were a hostage that summer. That it may not have been your will, to be here. May not have been your will, to befriend me.”

He searched my face for some kind of response, but I remained silent.

“You didn’t answer me before, at the feast.”

“Did not answer what?”

“I asked you if you missed me, Sigrunn.”

“You were cruel to me,” I spat at him, finally breaking. “I did not miss you. I came to hate you.”

Ivar only smiled at me, like I was being cute. “I’ll admit, I had a poor taste in games as a child.” He paused. “Now I am a man, and I’ve thought of some better ones since then.”

I heard the air hiss in between my teeth. I wasn’t sure what he was implying but a throbbing had started between my legs, imagining the kinds of games I had seen men play with women when they thought they were alone. “I know better than to play games with you now, Ivar,” I said bravely.

“So if I asked you to come sit beside me right now, you wouldn’t?”

My body froze, overwhelmed by my mixed feelings. I was only able to shake my head slightly.

Ivar leaned forward, fixed me with a ferocious gaze from under his brow. “Come sit beside me, Sigrunn.”

I should have turned, left the hall. He would not have been able to stop me. But I was transfixed; I didn’t ever want to stop looking at him. I didn’t want to walk away without knowing what would happen if I let him touch me this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not exactly sure what I'm doing with this story. I just really like it when Ivar fucks with people. I want him to fuck with me. Sexually.


	2. the feeling begins

Ivar’s laughing eyes followed me silently as I crossed the room to him and placed myself on his bench.

“Come closer, pet, I do not bite.”

“Actually you do,” I corrected him, recalling one of the tortures of our childhood together.

Ivar grinned and seemed taken away by a memory for a moment. “Oh yes, I had forgotten about that. You made the most interesting noises when I did that.”

I tried to suppress a shudder. Some part of me had hoped Ivar would have grown out of his cruelty by the time we met again.

He stretched his arm out, leaned his elbow on the table behind us. He beckoned me closer with a quick movement of his fingers. His eyes were so bright, like the sky on the first day of spring. It was unfair. They should have been dark like the sea before a storm. That would have been more accurate, and then perhaps I would not have pulled myself closer to him, settled with that outstretched arm of his at my back.

He didn’t touch me right away, but he leaned closer, inclining his head conspiratorially toward mine. “Remind me Sigrunn, what other games did we play?”

I tried to stick to the good memories. “I used to pull you in your ‘boat.’ Down hills, probably much too quickly.”

“Only because I asked you too,” he reassured. “What was your worry, that I might fall and break my legs?” He was always making brave jokes like that, but his mouth twisted on the words. He spoke again so I didn’t have to answer. “We used to pretend we were birds,” he recalled.

Another bitter memory choked me. “Or dogs. Or pigs.” Down on my hands and knees in front of him, more humiliation than fun. “You started calling me ‘sow’ and ‘bitch’ and laughing at me.” Just talking about it, under his unapologetic eyes, was making me feel that small again.

Ivar grimaced. “Those were not the right names for you.” He furrowed his brow. “I see now that you are grown, you are more like a wild mare, that no one has yet tamed.”

There was another word for that. “You think you are the one who is going to break me?” I teased. But my stomach sank as I said it.

Ivar looked at me with calculating eyes. “That could be amusing.”

I stiffened, turned away. We were both lost in our own thoughts for a moment. What did I want from this terrible man? Why was I still sitting here?

“You keep staring at me,” Ivar broke the silence when I glanced back up at him. “Since you arrived, every time I look over at you, you are looking at me.”

“You are the one who is always looking--”

He spoke over me as if I had not even started. There was a point he was coming to. “What is it about me that you find so interesting? It cannot be that I am a cripple. You never found that interesting before.”

It was true; if there were one thing the girl I was had taken the most pride in, it was in the way I strove to never make Ivar feel lesser or different because of the way he was born. At the time, I was interested in him because I was trying to impress his mother, noticed his condition only inasmuch as it had given me a reason to become helpful, to become more trusted by them.

I was thinking for too long. Ivar’s eyes started to cloud with doubt. “Answer me,” he demanded. “Why are you always looking at me?”

“You are—“ the torment in his face drove me to answer honestly. “Beautiful. I look at your face because it is so beautiful.”

Ivar looked at me for a long time without saying anything. Contradictory thoughts seemed to be swirling behind his eyes. He came to some decision. “Prove it.”

I tipped my head, asking for clarification.

“Prove that you feel something other than pity for me.” His eyes were raw, though he tried to hide that behind an upthrusted chin.

“I told you,” I said through gritted teeth, “I do. I feel hatred. I feel anger.” I wanted to stroke his cheek until the torment left his eyes, until that muscle in his jaw relaxed.

“Then why did you sit down here when I asked? Why have you not gone off to bed?”

I looked down at my hands, unwilling to admit defeat.

“Let me kiss you.” He said it and it hung there. He did not move, because I did not move. A good hunter knows when to lie still and let his prey come to him.

I tilted my head slightly, looked at him from the corner of my eye. He was solemn and expectant.

“I will know the answer, if I kiss you,” he said. “I will know by the way that you kiss me back.”

My heart was racing. He was so close. When had he gotten so close to me?

Ivar’s fingers ran oh so gently up my arm, swept my hair off my shoulder and began playing over the back of my neck. “If I don’t like the answer that your lips give me, I will leave you alone, how about that.”

I turned my face up to his, too tempted by his promises and his wide, full mouth. “All right, kiss me then,” I said, almost defiantly. I am Viking; I will go boldly into Hel.

Ivar’s gaze turned to my mouth, his hand came to rest around the back of my head. He pulled me toward him as he leaned in and my eyes closed on their own. He placed a kiss that was almost chaste upon my bottom lip. An odd rush, hot and cold at the same time, started swirling through my belly. He paused there, pressure so light. Then I felt his breath exhale over my skin and he pressed in harder, lips nipping and pulling at mine.

I couldn’t help but respond, opening to him, pushing back against his urgent pressure. I remembered too late that I should have been still and cold as a dead fish. Then he might possibly have kept his promise and left me alone.

Ivar tore his lips from me after a moment, but pressed his forehead to mine as he looked into my eyes. “There, you see?” he said lowly, delight and mockery both in his voice. “I knew that you still loved me.” Then he covered my mouth with his own again, before I could protest. In another moment I didn’t care, didn’t want to argue anymore. The tingling from my belly was spreading out into my limbs, up into my head, making me feel dizzy as Ivar’s lips worked against mine. I reached out to him tentatively, my palms sliding against the wool of his tunic. His stomach was taught and hard as iron.

I felt the fingers of Ivar’s other hand begin to trace down my cheek, fanning out over my neck. His thumb played over the delicate structures at the front of my throat; my breath caught and I couldn’t decide if the sensation were more erotic, or more threatening.

I was falling back under Ivar’s power already. I had barely even tried to stop it. I thought that maybe I should get up and end this here. But the delicious ache that had started between my legs was anchoring me right here, beside him.

Ivar’s lips left mine, started traveling down my jaw and under my ear. I heard myself panting into the cool air of the silent hall. “Do you want to be my pet again, Sigrunn?” he murmured into my skin, sending chills down my spine that mingled with the heat coming up from below. “Admit it, you are mine and mine alone.” His face burrowed into the bend between my neck and shoulder. I felt the scrape of his teeth and when I tried to pull away his fingers wrapped more firmly around my neck.

Ivar bit down, and it did not feel at all how I had expected. There was pain, yes, but it carried along with it a pleasure so sharp that I moaned, loud into the silence of the great hall.

The prince pulled back, looked at my face in astonishment. “You liked that?” he accused. What was the use in hiding it? I had already betrayed myself. I nodded, still breathing too quickly to form words. “ _And_ it hurt you,” he demanded to know. I nodded again. I could tell that this pleased him by the wicked way his eyes lit up at my confession. “You liked that and you want me to do it again.” I squirmed as he set his teeth to the side of my neck, strong hands now locked on my shoulders making it impossible to escape.

At least this time I tried to suppress the noises that were struggling up out of my throat. Ivar’s mouth was carrying out an exquisite assault against my flesh and I wasn’t sure how long I could take it. I balled my fists into his shirt, truly unsure whether I was trying to push him away or take off his clothing. Ivar was laughing between bites.

Deep, rough voices started carrying up from behind the door at the other end of the great hall. Ivar’s father, perhaps, or his older brothers, and what warriors that hadn’t joined the raiding party, returning to turn in for the night. I attempted to push Ivar off of me before they came inside.

“What is the matter?” Ivar asked, bringing his smirking face closer to mine. Not releasing his grip on my shoulders. I tried to pull the neckline of my dress back where it belonged; Ivar had just been scraping his teeth across the tops of my breasts.

“Someone is coming, do you not hear?” I hissed at him.

His lips broke into a wide grin. “Let them see,” he said proudly. “I want them to discover us like this.”

It was only a win for Ivar, to be found with a disheveled princess in his arms. He might be scolded for taking advantage of the hostage, but there would be a proud smile on the face of his father, there would be no true weight behind the admonishment. I would be the only one who would be shamed, and gossiped about.

She let the mad cripple touch her.

The great door was squealing open. I twisted and pushed myself to my feet. Ivar’s fingers scraped across my arms, but I had moved too quickly for him to hold on. As soon as I was free of him I ran for the back chambers where the women slept.

“Sigrunn!” Ivar hissed after me, but not loudly enough that the raucous men entering the hall from the other side would have heard. Apparently, he wanted them to know when I was in his arms, but not when I was running away from him.

I spared Ivar only one glance before I left the hall. Displeasure and pain weighed evenly on his face as he stared after me. I had truly wounded him with this retreat.

So I wasn’t entirely powerless, then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After this point, the story becomes explicit, dub-con, and much kinkier. Please mind the tags and decide if you actually want to proceed, or say "thank you and goodnight" to my Ivar right now.
> 
> For those who are still in, the fuckery has only just begun...


	3. on the edge of a knife

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is now officially an AU. In which everything is the same except that the mid-season-four time jump lasted however long it takes to get Ivar up past the age of legal consent in your country. Y’all get me?  
> 
> Story is now rated “Explicit” and tagged for acrophobia, BDSM themes with dubious consent, knife play (cutting), and blood. Please decide if you should keep reading accordingly. I would hate to think I squicked someone out just because they like reading about Ivar. There are other stories out there, use your best judgment. 
> 
> Reference for “spae-kona” and Viking magic here: http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/seidhr.shtml

I stared into the mirror hanging on the wall of my sleeping chamber, a room I shared with the other unmarried women attached to Aslaug’s household. I had lain in bed until the others had all left, my mind such a whirlwind that I could not bear to meet anyone’s eye. Now, alone, my fingers traced the purple marks Ivar had left across my chest and neck. It hadn’t felt like such torture last night, but it looked horrendous.

Had I really allowed him to do that to me? What kind of woman was I? I was no warrior, but I was a warrior’s daughter, and I should not be any man’s victim. But heat rose from my womanhood as I remembered the scrape of Ivar’s teeth against my skin.

Was it a mistake, kissing him? What were his true intentions toward me? The blue eyes staring back from the mirror were giving me no answers.

I wondered if Ivar found the rosebud shape of my lips attractive, or if my mouth were just too small for my face.

I sighed and turned to my trunk. Thank the gods I had packed at least one high-necked dress. The collar of the green linen one was high enough to cover almost every mark. I brushed my hair out in front of my shoulders, praying that would hide the rest.

I was the last to join the family’s table; everyone was already at their breakfast. The only empty seat was next to Ivar, source of all my torment. A chill descended upon me, and I tried to summon the strength to approach the table by cursing whatever god was neglecting to watch over me. Ivar greeted me with a smirk when I sat down. He leaned in with a quiet comment. “It is such a warm day, Princess, why would you wear such a heavy dress?”

I met his eyes with great effort. Amusement, warmth, and disappointment were all dancing there in turns.

“Is it, my Prince? I feel nothing but cold.” Then I tipped my head submissively and helped myself to the bread and salted fish at the center of the table.

I felt a twinge of regret, feeling Ivar’s eyes bore into me as I ate my breakfast. It was a cruel thing to say after what had passed between us last night, especially given how I had ended things.

Sigurd and Ubbe were excitedly planning a hunting trip, debating how far out they should go, how many days to be gone. Ivar was silent. I wondered if he were invited. I knew he trained with his brothers; had seen him shoot a bow with impressive accuracy. But he held himself apart from them too, as he always had, and from what I had seen his brothers often included him in their plans only as an afterthought. I risked a glance at him; his jaw clenched as he watched his brothers speak. My heart wept for him in that moment.

My conflicting feelings for Ivar Ragnarsson were making me dizzy. I looked down at my hands and felt my soul cry out for guidance.

There was a seer at Kattegat, but a crawling feeling wormed through my belly every time I looked at him. I did not want to go to him for help. Scrying was women’s magic anyway. The most respected _spae-kona_ here was Queen Aslaug, but I could never bring this topic to her. I would have to consult the gods myself.

“Queen Aslaug,” I asked formally, “would it be alright if I went to visit Frigg’s grove today? I have not yet paid my respects to the goddess since I have arrived in Kattegat.”

Aslaug smiled at my demonstration of piety. “Yes, of course, child. You may leave as soon as you are finished with your meal.”

*****

I had slipped a small bowl from the table, and twisted a bit of salt from the storeroom into a scrap of fabric. After I paid my respects to Frigg I intended to scry for my answers in the sacred grove. I had always had more success with that bit of magic when I was in one of the gods’ places. The hike from Kattegat to the place of worship was a short one, a pleasant trip through tall trees and flowering fields. Eventually the path wound up into the hills, then opened onto a grove of white-barked trees sacred to the mother goddess.

I laid my cloak down on the forest floor near the center of the grove, enjoying the sound of the breeze fluttering the leaves all around me as I knelt up on it. Closing my eyes, I sat and tried to commune with the goddess for a while. I thanked her for my family’s safe arrival at Kattegat, and for the warm reception and comfortable care I was being given by Aslaug.

I wasn’t sure if I could thank her for Ivar. Thoughts of his fierce eyes and laughing mouth kept troubling me, tearing my mind away from the calm and focus I was trying to achieve in this place. I laid back with a sigh, watched the leaves move in the branches overhead for a while, feeling the cool air play across my skin.

The women of my home had instructed me to always begin a scrying this way – with a clear mind and gratitude in one’s heart. It took a different kind of sight than we use for the mundane parts of the day; and one had to become one with the sacred world in order to access that sight. Letting go of all preoccupations and attachments.

When I could no longer judge how much time had passed since I had started watching the leaves, I knew I was ready to begin. I sat up and retrieved the little clay bowl and poured out the twist of salt into the bottom. I lifted my waterskin and poured the water in slowly, observing the way the grains of salt swirled in its eddies before disappearing. When the bowl was full, I set the skin down and put both my hands around its edges. “Speak to me, great seer, great mother Frigg. I have always been your devoted servant. Tell me true, am I to welcome the attentions of Ivar Ragnarsson, or should I spurn him?”

Then I tipped the bowl slowly, back and forth, and watched the shimmering reflection of the trees above for my answer.

I saw only leaves. Their edges bent and shook oddly, but none took a form that meant anything to me. After a while my arms tired and I placed the bowl on the ground, bent over it on knees and elbows, still rocking the water gently with both hands. I positioned my face above the bowl, to see if I could find more answers in the reflection of my own eyes. My golden hair streamed down either side, forming a curtain around the scrying. And still I saw nothing that meant anything to me.

I heard a scraping in the dirt behind me. I whipped my head toward its source and saw Prince Ivar himself, propped up on his elbows at the head of the path back to Kattegat.

“What are you doing here?” I demanded, before more polite words could form on my tongue. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t heard him approaching earlier. I felt as if I had been caught out doing something shameful, though _spae_ -craft was an honest woman’s art. I suppose it was because of the nature of the question I had asked, which I had been focusing on so strenuously I felt as if I had been shouting it.

“Can I not also pay my respects to the gods?” Ivar smirked, fixing me with his predatory gaze. “Do not let me bother you from whatever it is that you are doing over there. I am just enjoying the view.”

He was just a few feet behind my upturned ass. I sat back on my heels quickly, hair flying in a cloud around me and no longer screening my work.

Ivar chuckled, seeming proud that he could so easily fluster me. “Scrying, is it? What is it that you are trying to see?”

“I am asking the goddess about my father’s safety on his long journey,” I lied quickly.

“Such a faithful daughter,” Ivar intoned, not believing me for a second. He dragged himself closer to me and my bowl. “And did you receive your answer?”

“I did not,” I sighed, looking down at the frustratingly mundane image on the water’s reflection.

“Let me take a look,” Ivar said, pulling himself up beside me.

“No!” I shouted before he could peer inside the bowl. I knocked it on its side without thinking.

Ivar leaned back, looked at me like he had just achieved some kind of victory. And of course he had. My chance for the gods’ counsel was over. No one was going to help me decide what to do about the man grinning beside me.

I righted the spilled bowl slowly, closed my eyes and tried to send one final prayer to the Allmother. _Please keep me safe from harm._ It was impossible to keep connection with the spirit of the sacred when I could feel Ivar looming beside me, however. The constant thrum of bitter anger he carried with him everywhere was almost palpable. I sighed and began gathering my things.

“Time to go?” Ivar asked.

“I have concluded my business,” I said haughtily as I stood. I lifted my cloak from the ground, tugged at the corner Ivar was still sitting on.

He pushed both hands against the ground to lift his hips to the side, allowing the fabric to spring free from underneath him. I was still impressed at the grace with which he had learned to move his body despite his weak legs. When we were children he had constantly been under Aslaug’s wing, but now it seemed he went wherever he willed, and did as he pleased.

“Let me escort you back to Kattegat, then,” Ivar said, matching my formal tone.

“But you have only just arrived, do you not need time yourself to pray?”

Ivar answered only with a smile more frightening that any warrior’s snarl. He had come all the way up here just for me, and he wasn’t even going to pretend to hide that. I tossed my hair and turned toward the path, covering the chill that realization brought down upon me.

I should not have been frightened. I had only to be rude, walk more quickly than normal down the trail, and Ivar’s crawl would not have been able to keep up with me. But I did not even consider it. I did harbor affection for Ivar, despite the many reasons I had to dislike him. I would never be so petty as to insult him with insensitivity to his limitations.

A little way down the path, Ivar stopped me. “Let us turn off here, I want to show you something.” He indicated a little game trail snaking away from the path, further up the hill.

I hesitated. “I really should be getting back, the queen might have need of me.”

Ivar flipped his hand dismissively. “She has plenty of slaves to do things for her. I will tell Mother you were with me, and there will be no trouble. Come on.” He started pulling himself down the little path, barely more than a gap in the underbrush.

I inhaled deeply. I had run out of any excuse besides the real one. _I am afraid to be alone with you again, Ivar_. The words did not come out of my mouth. Besides, fear and excitement are two sides of the same coin. I pulled a low branch aside and strode into the wood after him.

I followed Ivar’s dragging legs disappearing under the overhanging brush ahead of me for only a few minutes before the trees thinned. I saw we were approaching a cliffside overlooking the fjord. Ivar continued boldly right up to the edge, then raised himself up on one elbow to look back at me. For once, his smile was bright and free of malice or ulterior motives. “Is it not beautiful up here, Sigrunn?”

It was. The sky was a clear, bright blue today, the waters of the fjord matching it just two shades darker. Several gulls were soaring over the water, and higher above us I thought I saw the outline of an eagle. My feet stopped a few feet behind Ivar.

“Come, sit with me here. You can’t even see the best part from there.” Then he dropped his head, peering over what appeared to be a sheer drop to the water, hundreds of feet below us. A sickening wave of anxiety shot through me.

“I am afraid of heights,” I confessed. Ivar looked back up at me, one eyebrow raised. “I always feel as if I will lose my balance and tumble right over the edge.”

“Then get down off your stupid legs and crawl,” Ivar scoffed, like the answer was obvious. I supposed it was, to him. “Or are you too proud to get on your belly in the dirt with me, oh great Princess?”

I glared at him a moment, then dropped to my hands and knees. I looked at the rocky edge. A few twisted trees clung by roots woven into the stone, but there was little other life so close to the drop. Just Ivar and his mocking smile. From this low position the anxiety eased enough for me to crawl a few yards closer; my face was even with Ivar’s feet when I lost my nerve again. What if the rocks began to crumble?

“You are doing great,” Ivar said in a low, reassuring tone. “Come up here alongside me, the view is incredible.”

I took a deep breath and pulled myself closer, losing my nerve and dropping to my belly just before I reached the edge. I felt Ivar’s hand fall soothingly onto my back. I lay there for a moment, gathering myself. I must have looked like such a fool, but the fear was choking me, paralyzing. I hid my face in my hands, willing my heart to calm, telling myself I was not going to fall. Ivar’s hand continued to stroke me; I hadn’t imagined him capable of such patience. I focused on slow, steady breaths, then raised my head when I felt ready. It still felt like the open air were sucking at me, but it was better.

I gasped when Ivar pushed himself up and swung his legs around until they were dangling off the cliff. Was he crazy? “I love it up here,” he said with a contented sigh, looking down at me almost condescendingly. “Are you ready to look off the edge yet, little princess?”

I took a deep breath and inched my body up, until I could see that there was another small ledge about five feet below Ivar’s dangling legs. He’d still be stuck if he fell that far, but it did reduce the vertigo to see a closer landing place. Tiny purple flowers danced in the breeze on that ledge, of a type I had never seen before. Past them there was only the deep blue of the sea.

“That _is_ beautiful, Ivar,” I said truthfully. Despite the creeping anxiety, I was glad I had come. I wondered if this was my sign from the gods, a patch of rare beauty in the midst of cold and fearsome rock.

“Sit with me,” Ivar asked, laying a hand on my shoulder again. “I know you are brave enough.” When I didn’t move he added: “You can hold on to me if you need to.”

I took one more deep breath, then rolled onto my side, putting my back against him. Just feeling a warm human body helped me feel calmer. Ever so carefully, I swung my legs around and settled on my bottom beside Ivar, melding my hip against his. His strong arm squeezed snugly around my waist, and I slowly tried to remember how to breathe as we looked out into the open air above the fjord.

I could feel Ivar’s chest rising and falling with his own steady breaths, our sides pressed together. I focused on matching my lungs to his, and the dizziness subsided.

“Feeling better, pet?” Ivar asked after a few moments.

“I am not your pet,” I said without hesitation. The heights were making me honest.

Ivar chuckled, pressing his mouth into the top of my head. “You don’t want to be my pet again?” he asked into my hair. “I think you felt differently last night.”

A deep sigh struggled through me. The feel of him so close, his voice rumbling in his chest, was already seducing me into that same trance as last night. Still, I managed to answer him. “I am a princess, not a plaything.”

His hand came to my cup my face, rough thumb stroking my cheek. “You worry I am not taking you seriously. You are the only one I want to play with, do not worry yourself about that,” he said.

That wasn’t exactly the problem, though I was ashamed of how much warmth pooled around my heart at those words. It was hard to think, hard to stay clear on who I was and what I wanted, right now. “I cannot talk about this here,” I told him. “Please, can we move away from the edge now?”

“Afraid you’ll plummet off the cliff?” Ivar asked, cruelty creeping into his voice. Then he twisted me suddenly toward the waters far, far below us. I screamed and clung to him and his strong arms pulled me in tighter.

It was only a feint; my weight had barely shifted off the stone we were resting on. It didn’t matter. My heart was racing now, and I felt a thick panic creeping up my throat. “Please, Ivar,” I begged into his chest. I was now too terrified to try and stand or move away on my own. I felt like if I shifted my body at all, I would somehow be flung right into the open air.

Ivar stroked my hair with a considering hum. Then he heaved a great sigh. “Alright, I will have mercy on you then.” I sobbed in relief when he dragged both of us back, away from the cliff’s edge.

When we had moved far enough for me to feel secure, I pulled away from him, laying flat on my back and closing my eyes. I tried to think of nothing but the solid feeling of the ground below me. Slowly, I came back to myself.

I head Ivar pulling himself closer to me again. “Arsehole,” I spit, without opening my eyes. “Stay away.”

“Do not be angry with me, Sigrunn,” Ivar said, a placating tone in his voice. “It was only a joke.”

“It was _not_ funny.”

“Okay. It was not funny. But it was worth it to feel you cling to me like that.” I could hear from the way his voice changed that he was leaning over me now, but still I refused to open my eyes.

“You are still an arsehole.”

He grunted, and I could imagine the shrug that went with the noise. Then I felt his breath on my cheek. “Let me make it up to you.”

A thrill shot through my core, but I ignored it. “No.”

He huffed again, and I felt him sit up next to me.

We passed a few minutes in silence. I became conscious of the sound of the wind again, rising and falling through the leaves; the soft twitter of the forest birds. I was calmer now. I should be leaving. I couldn’t figure out what I was waiting for, but my limbs showed no interest in moving.

Ivar’s finger brushed against my neck, just above the high collar of my dress. “Did I do that to you?” he asked, real interest in his voice.

It took me a moment to think of what he was talking about. Oh yes, the bite marks from the night before. “You did,” I said, finally opening my eyes and glaring at him, as bravely as I could.

He ignored my eyes, too fascinated by the purple marks on my skin. His clever fingers went to the buttons at my throat.

“What are you doing?” I cried, stopping his hand with my own.

“I want to see the rest,” he said intently. His eyes were dark and demanding. It didn’t take long for me to melt under that gaze, to find that I did not want to deny him. I released his fingers and dropped my hand back down to my side.

My breaths started coming fast again as I lay on my back and watched him undress me. Every freed button revealed a little more of my chest, and when he reached the level of my breasts he did not stop, even though the skin was unblemished below there. I rushed to catch his hand again, before he could undo me anymore.

He smirked at me, but let go of the buttons. He spread the fabric wide, revealing my shoulders and the rising swells of my breasts. My nipples were only barely covered. I watched his eyes following the black and purple lines he had left on me last night. Arousal, pride, and something deeper, stranger, lit up his face. I was already on fire, to see him look at me like that.

Ivar leaned down, holding himself up with one hand on either side of my body, and kissed one of the marks on my chest. “My brave little princess.” Another kiss, this time on my shoulder. “Such beautiful things you let me do to you.” He nuzzled his face into the side of my neck, making me squirm again. Then he laid down beside me, propped up on one elbow. He pressed his hand to my cheek and leaned in to capture my mouth. Ivar kissed me more boldly than he had last night, pressing his tongue past my lips, coaxing and sucking at my tongue.

I rolled toward him, running my hands over his chest, around his shoulders. People look at Ivar’s legs and think that he is weak, but every muscle above his waist is as hard as iron. Soon I was burrowing my hands under his tunic, exploring every angle and plane.

Ivar’s hands were doing the same, curving around my waist and over my hip as we rolled in the grass together. It felt like I just couldn’t get my body close enough to his. I moaned his name in frustration while a distant part of me looked on, hating that he was making me feel this way.

Ivar pressed my shoulders to the ground, rolling partly on top of me. He broke the kiss and looked down at my neck with a playful twist to his face. His brows furrowed. “It looks like I missed a spot, right here,” he said, and dropped his head like a striking snake before I could flinch and stop him. His teeth worried at the sensitive flesh in the crook of my neck while I arched my back and gasped. Just as before, the pain sparked a new rush of pleasure more powerful than any kiss had ever given me. I ground my hips into him and moaned.

Ivar picked his head up again, reading the tormented pleasure in my face again. “You are not like any woman I have ever met,” he said, a touch of amazement in his voice. Then he made a frustrated noise and settled on his elbows, started removing his bracers. Ivar wore modified archer’s gauntlets everywhere, to protect his hands from the ground as he crawled. “I want to feel you better,” he growled as he struggled to take them off quickly. Then he dragged one bare hand down my breastbone. He watched my breath catch as he slid his palm to the side and under my dress, scooping over the soft flesh of my breast until it was cupped in his hand.

He squeezed, lightly, then ran his thumb over my nipple. Instantly it hardened and I felt a shock of pleasure run straight from there to my core. I must have made a noise that pleased him because Ivar did it again and again, watching my face in fascination. Then he gripped around my breast harder and twisted.

My brows creased and I cried out at the mild pain he had just caused me. “Gentle, please!” I scolded him.

“Shush,” Ivar said, then encased my nipple in his mouth. He flicked his tongue and I spasmed. His hand crept under my gaping dress, pulling my other breast free. He pinched and tugged at it, still sucking on the other nipple, until I thought that I would go mad. “Ivar, please!” I pleaded, not even knowing what I was asking for. Pleasure wound through my gut and I felt hot all over.

His mouth left my breast and came back to kissing me. I was sure in a moment Ivar would be taking his pants off, to do what men always want to do to women, and I was almost sure that I was ready for him.

Instead, Ivar stopped moving. He propped himself up above me again, eyes clouded and strange. “I am sorry, but I cannot stop thinking about something, Sigrunn.” He paused dramatically before continuing. “You ran away from me last night. You humiliated me in front of my father.” A shock of fear ran through me; Ivar was sounding colder and more hateful with every word. “And now, I must punish you for that.”

There was still a chance this was just a joke. “Who are you to punish me?” I played along, more bravely than I felt. “My father’s lands are greater than your father’s, after all.”

“But you are here, in _my_ domain. Besides,” he said, leaning in so that his lips brushed the shell of my ear as he spoke, “I told you last night, you are already mine, in your heart. You belong to me. And you have displeased me. So now you are going to let me punish you.” I saw his arm reach back, behind his hip, and return holding a thin dagger with a glistening sharpened edge.

The fear was like glacial water spreading through my chest as Ivar lowered that blade to my neck. When that ice hit the fire that had been burning in my belly, I found to my horror that one did not quench the other. The two sensations mingled such that each enhanced the other, overwhelming any other thought. I was terrified and I was more aroused than I had ever been in my life.

Ivar drew the knife down my skin, dragging the flat side so that I could feel the sharpness of the edge but was not cut. Was he truly going to cut me, was that what he meant by punishment, or was the fear enough? My eyes pleaded at him to stop and my hips writhed at him for more.

“Are you sorry?” Ivar asked, his tone mocking.

Maybe all that he wanted was for me to beg. “Yes,” I cried, “I am very sorry, Ivar!”

“I don’t believe that you mean it,” he said, “you are just trying to delay your punishment.” Then he dragged the point of the blade across my chest to the shoulder, a white-hot sting following behind it.

I jerked but Ivar was laying on top of me now, holding me in place. “Stay still, or I might slip,” he chided me.

Another wave of fear swept down over me. It was so hard not to flinch, but he was right. If I struggled too much the knife might only cut deeper. I tried very hard to still my shaking muscles.

Ivar made another shushing sound between his teeth, soft and soothing, then drew the sharp edge of the blade over my shoulder again. I shuddered, but my reaction was delayed and the knife was already away.

Ivar and I both stared as the blood welled up out of this cut, deeper than the first. It was beautiful and terrible. Just like him. Ivar’s eyes were almost black, his pupils were so wide as he stared at the drop of blood, swelling full and heavy. Just before it fell he dropped his head, caught it with his tongue.

“You are doing so good,” he intoned to me, then set the knife to my skin again.

“Ivar, please,” I started, but he pressed down again and a strangled scream overtook my other words. This one was longer than the last.

“Just one more, and then your punishment will be done,” he said, like this were all very reasonable. It was just a quick slice, angled differently than the last. Was he drawing runes on me?

I could not see what he had done, because Ivar pressed his mouth to my wound again, this time dragging his tongue across the cuts. The fire in my loins tried one more time to ignite, but I managed to suppress it this time. What was happening right now was crazy. I needed to get out from under Ivar and away from here as quickly as possible.

Ivar was still staring at the damage he had done. I rolled my eyes down to my shoulder; it did look like a rune. Algiz. At the time, I could not even remember what it stood for. Had he chosen that shape on purpose, or was the pattern only an accident?

The blood was welling up again. The cuts might be too superficial to scar. Time would tell. Ivar leaned down and licked them clean one more time. “This is my claim,” he said, voice rough. He turned his crazy blue eyes to capture mine. “I claim you, Sigrunn Haraldsdottir.” He pressed one last kiss to my lips; I could taste my blood on him. Then he started buttoning my dress back up for me.

I remained motionless, floating, coming down off all the many things he had been making me feel. Ivar buttoned me carefully; I felt like a doll. A cherished doll.

Ivar began talking again, though it was hard to focus on his words. “My father is going back to England. He is gathering boats and warriors now.” I had heard rumors to that effect, the old king giving away his treasures in the streets and begging the old men Bjorn had left behind for support. “I plan to go with him,” Ivar said, then laid down beside me and gathered me into his arms.

I didn’t feel anything in reaction to his words. Not yet, not when I was so burnt out and numb. I thought idly that if I was smart, I would be happy about this. “When are you leaving?” I asked dreamily.

“A week at most, father says. Some of the old boats are being fixed.”

Bjorn had taken all the best men and boats with him already. I felt a flash of pity for the once-great Ragnar Lothbrok. “Have you told your mother yet?”

Ivar shifted. “No.” He started to stroke my cheek with the back of his fingers absently. “No, I fear that she will not take it well.”

“I imagine not,” I agreed. “Her favorite son.”

“Can we stop talking about my mother right now?” Ivar said crossly.

“Of course.” Ivar’s stomach growled loudly. “How long have we been up here?” I asked, examining the angle of the sun. “We’ve missed the midday meal, certainly.”

“We will go back down in a moment,” Ivar said. “For now I just want to hold you.”


	4. a moment of peace

_Protection._ That was the meaning of the rune Algiz. I stared at the angry red lines reflected in the mirror. The bite marks had mostly healed in the night, but now there was a wheal across my chest, and the marks forming the rune had scabbed over.

I looked up into the pale blue eyes staring back from my reflection. Where is your fire, daughter of Harald, I screamed at myself. Where is your self-respect? He carved into your flesh.

 _Protection_. Had Ivar meant it that way, had he put magic into the blade as he cut me? He had said he was leaving soon, raiding in England. Was this his way of taking care of me while he was gone? I had heard that Floki had taught him _seiðr_.

Or was I just being a stupid girl, justifying and excusing what was only cruelty; base sick desire.

I watched my own face redden in the mirror. If it were a sick desire, it was one that I shared. There was no avoiding that realization either. When I looked at Ivar’s work upon my body I wanted to lay back down and touch myself, remembering the hungry and reverent look in his eyes when he dragged that blade across my skin. I was proud to have made him feel those things.

Gods help me, I wanted him to do more. Perhaps it was a blessing that he would be out raiding this summer after all, if I couldn’t be trusted to save myself from him. I wondered idly how much damage he could do to me in a week.

*****

I took breakfast alone with Aslaug that morning. Ubbe and Sigurd were away on their hunting trip, and their younger brother had never appeared.

“Where is Ivar?” I finally asked, hoping the queen wouldn’t read too much into my interest. I wasn’t ready for her to know something was passing between myself and her son.

“He is in too much pain today, from his legs. He is not able to get out of bed.” Aslaug seemed preoccupied, staring up at the narrow window which was letting in a few weak beams of sunlight.

Ivar’s pain had fluctuated when last I stayed at Kattegat, as well. There were days when we all had to grit our teeth through the sound of him moaning and shrieking in the back of the hall. Then Harbard had come, and when he left he had taken much of Ivar’s pain with him. “Are you still rubbing his legs, like Harbard taught us?”

Aslaug looked up at me sharply, suddenly coming back to the present. “I had forgotten you were here for that. And that he taught you the magic as well.” She frowned at me a moment longer. “Yes, I still make the salve and rub it in, as Harbard showed me. I have not yet done it today. It hasn’t seemed to be as helpful as it once was.”

I dropped my head, though I was burning with more questions. I remembered Harbard’s praise of my technique, and how I had always thought that Aslaug wasn’t understanding what he was teaching us. She had a blind faith in his magic, hoped that he was fixing him. I saw that there was an immediate, tangible benefit in the pressure Harbard was applying to Ivar’s cramping muscles, outside of the ritual of his _seiðr_.

“You may go try your hand at it today,” Aslaug announced suddenly. “Since you think yourself worthy of questioning my care of him.” I jumped as if I had been slapped. I hadn’t meant to insult her. Aslaug sipped at her cup for another moment, then reached out and took my hand. When I met her eyes, I saw her forcing herself to be kinder. “Thank you,” she said more gently, “for caring about my son’s well-being. I know he does not make himself easy to like, and I appreciate the kindness you have always shown him.”

I smiled meekly in return. This was the moment I had been working toward so earnestly in my youth, trying so desperately to gain Aslaug’s love and approval. It was not as wonderful as I had imagined. Her graceful smile was beaming down on me, but all she was seeing was her son, and how I could be of use to him. I bowed my head to her. “I will do my best for him,” I said humbly. “Perhaps, should I go now? To not keep him suffering for longer.”

“Yes,” Aslaug said, sitting back and releasing my hand. She lifted a small stoppered bottle from the table before her, setting it in front of me. “The salve is here, go and see what you can do.”

“If he lets me,” I added, realizing with a flash of nerves that I had no idea if Ivar would allow me to see, much less touch, his legs, after so much time had passed. Not to mention all that had started happening between us, these past few days.

“If he lets you,” Aslaug agreed. She made no offer to come with me, to ease him into the idea. Had they been arguing? Had he told her he was leaving? I stood and took a step back toward the room where the boys slept. “He is not there,” Aslaug called to my back. “He is resting in my bed. He says it is much more comfortable than his own.”

I tried to keep my face blank as I changed course, to the king and queen’s bedroom. Which had belonged solely to the queen since shortly after I left Kattegat the last time, King Ragnar being absent and openly hated by his wife. Ivar used to sleep with his mother at times, when we were that young, for comfort, though whether it was more for his or hers no one could say. I tried not to wonder when they had stopped doing that.

“You have grown into such a beautiful young woman, Sigrunn,” Aslaug commented suddenly, just before I walked away from her. There was an appraising look in her eyes, and I waited for her to say more. Instead, she dismissed me with a raised hand, turning her gaze to the window again.

I realized with a jolt that there were more dangers for me at Kattegat than I thought. I was useful to the Lothbroks as a hostage right now, but an alliance cemented through marriage would have even more power. If I wasn’t careful this summer, I might find myself the wife of Ivar the Boneless. ~~~~

*****

I tapped lightly on the door to the Queen’s chamber, and was answered with a groan from its current occupant. “I do not wish to be bothered today,” Ivar growled.

I pushed the wooden partition aside, just a crack. “It is Sigrunn,” I said timidly, already regretting all my choices. Wasn’t I supposed to be doing my best to avoid this man, especially in his foul tempers? When we were children he had been at his most cruel when he was hurting.

“Sigrunn?” he echoed, voice softening just a little. “You… you may enter.”

I slipped in quickly, closing the door behind me. Ivar lay on his back under a knit blanket, on a pile of furs in the center of the great bed that dominated the room. We were dimly lit by the weak, cloud-screened sunlight coming in from a few small windows near the roof.

“Who told you I was here,” he asked irritably, “Mother?” I nodded. “Why did she send you to me?”

I held up the little bottle. “Do you remember, Harbard taught me as well…” I trailed off under Ivar’s burning eyes. They were creased at the corners, his pain visible as he glared at me.

Abruptly, Ivar twisted his mouth into an entirely mirthless smile. “Fine. Come tend to the cripple.” Then he looked away, but not before I could see the shame and apprehension in his eyes.

“I can go get your mother,” I offered, not wanting to force him into anything he wasn’t comfortable with. “I am sure she would come do it, if I told her you would not accept me—“

“I am sure that is what you would prefer,” Ivar said icily, still staring at the wall.

I sighed. Two days ago I told him I hated him, and I thought I had meant it. If I walked away right now, he would probably believe that I did.

I took one step toward him, then another. “Ivar.” He looked up at me then, eyes brimming with that sad anger that was always simmering under everything he ever did. The anger that only the gods would ever have the power to take away. “I would like to try.” I thought his eyes softened just a fraction. “Did you not like how I did it, when we were children?”

Ivar’s smile was almost real, then, sliding shyly from behind the fortress of his anger. “I liked the way you did it even better than Mother, or Harbard,” he said fondly. “I did miss your touch, after you were gone.”

I ducked my head, hiding a blush. He hadn’t meant it to sound so intimate, surely; we had only been children. But in the light of whatever was happening between us now, my mind could not help but make the connection. “I would like to try, see if I can remember the proper technique,” I said. “I just… do not wish to intrude, if you do not wish it.”

“You think I am embarrassed,” Ivar frowned. He was throwing a bravado into his voice that I knew to be false. “I am as the gods made me.” He leaned forward, narrowing his eyes at me. “Go ahead, get on your knees like a slave and tend to my needs. Let us see what you can do to make me feel better.”

His words were cruel, his implication crass, but I forgave him this one instantly. I had seen the vulnerability behind his eyes and I let him soothe himself the way he always did, by trying to hurt someone else.

I approached the bedside and hesitated. Ivar rested his head back against the pillows and stared up at me imperiously. “Well?” he asked, curling his lip. “Get on with it.” His fingers splayed in the air, indicating his blanket-covered legs.

Pulling my skirt out of my way, I knelt upon the bed next to Ivar, even with his knees. I let my fingers rest on his shin just for a moment before I pushed the blanket off one leg. Any further hesitation on my part would only have been more insulting.

His leg actually looked better than it had when we were children. His muscles were weak and gnarled, but the bones had grown straight and long despite the name his father had given him at birth. I took the stopper out of the bottle of salve. “I am not sure if I remember the incantation,” I said.

“Then fuck the incantation,” Ivar snapped. “Just do what you can, I hurt.” He squeezed his eyes shut.

I poured out some of the salve into my hands. It was mostly seal oil, infused with sacred herbs, if Aslaug was still making it the same way. I wrapped my hands around Ivar’s ankle and began spreading the salve over his skin, up his shin and around his knee. After a few passes I started to press in deeper with my palms, against the denser parts of his muscles. Ivar sighed, making me look up. His eyes were still closed, but there was less tension in his brow.

My movements gained more confidence, and I spread more salve up the side of his skinny thigh. I closed my eyes too, summoning the memories of how Harbard had taught me to ease the cramping. Find the places where the muscles felt knotted and press in, with thumb or knuckle. I couldn’t remember his ritual words so I simply prayed, asking the gods to show mercy, ease the suffering they had seen fit to inflict upon Ivar.

I pushed deeply into a stubborn knot on Ivar’s thigh and he groaned. “I am sorry!” I exclaimed, removing my hands from him. “I did not mean to hurt you!”

Ivar’s hand caught mine, guided it back to his leg. “Keep going,” he said. “Mother never presses this hard, but it feels good. Like the pain that you are causing is beating back the ache.”

I nodded and continued my work. After a time it did feel like his muscles were getting softer, more relaxed. I took a moment to thank the gods for answering my prayers.

Ivar opened his eyes again when I was pressing at the top of his leg, just below his hip-bone. “I like you being the one to do this,” he said, lifting his head with an impish smile. “You know, there is something else that you can rub under this blanket, too.” He rolled his hips toward me.

I was halfway into my _spae_ -craft trance, trying so hard to commune with the gods. From here, his comment was only an annoyance. “Ivar. Am I easing your pain with what I am doing right now?”

His teasing smile slipped, and he nodded seriously.

“Then shut up and let me finish.”

I expected Ivar to keep pushing. He was always pushing, at everyone. At the world. But he only inclined his head like I had made a good point and collapsed back into the furs.

I pulled the blanket back over his leg, switched to uncover the other side and repeat. Ivar spoke no more, and when I looked at his face halfway through my work on this leg my heart skipped a beat. He was so relaxed, so at peace, that he looked like a different person. His perfect brow uncreased, his strong jaw smooth and free of tension, his shapely lips slack and slightly parted. I stared longer than was polite, but his eyes were closed and he did not catch me. He looked like the image of fair Baldr, before Loki hurled the deadly mistletoe. I was almost sad to disturb him when I had to ask him to turn over so I could apply the salve to the backside of his legs.

These muscles were thicker, and also more painful. My work was punctuated by moans and groans but always Ivar bid me to continue. I was sweating by the time I was done.

I spread the blanket silently back over Ivar and tiptoed toward the door. He seemed so peaceful now; perhaps he wished to sleep.

"Sigrunn,” Ivar called, rousing himself before I could leave. He rolled onto his side to face me. “You must be tired. Come rest here beside me for a while." He stroked the fur on one side of the giant bed. For once, there was not a hint of malice in his voice. A spoiled prince accustomed to being obeyed, yes, but he seemed too relaxed to be planning any cruelty.

My hands itched to stroke his smooth cheeks and untroubled brow. A small voice warned me not to trust him, even now, but I was seduced by this vision of the lovely boy he might have been without all the pain he had to bear. I stepped lightly back to the bed and lay down on my back beside him.

I was tired from the work, he had not been wrong about that. It felt wonderful to let my arms and back sink into the furs, their effort complete. “How do you feel?” I asked him shyly.

Ivar rolled onto his back as well and let out a long, considering breath. “The pain is almost gone,” he said, a hint of wonder in his voice. Then, quietly: “Thank you, Sigrunn.”

I wasn’t sure if Ivar had ever thanked anyone in his life. Probably only his mother. The two of us relaxed in companionable silence for a while, contemplating the ceiling.

"You truly are not disgusted by my legs,” Ivar suddenly said.

“No, Ivar,” I spoke the truth simply and honestly, “I am only disgusted by your actions." I wasn’t sure why I felt like now was the time to challenge him, except that I feared how close this moment was about to make us, how far I was in danger of being sucked into his life, proving myself a useful nursemaid on top of everything else.

The young prince rolled toward me again, face still so relaxed and even, as both our heads rested on the same pillow. “You do not enjoy the time we have been spending together?”

I did, but I should not have. “That is not the point,” I said, shaking my head slightly to keep it clear. “You think only of yourself, and my stomach turns when you amuse yourself with cruelty to others.”

“And what about when I amuse myself with cruelty to you?” he asked slowly, running his fingers up my arm, letting his hand come to rest on my sleeve, just above the wounds he had inflicted yesterday.

I blushed, unable to form any words that would answer him clearly. Why had I thought anything I could say would change him?

"What can I do to prove to you that I am not always selfish?" he asked then, brilliant blue eyes shining down on me with sudden warmth.

I did not know how to answer that either. Truthfully, the best way for him to prove that would be to think of some kindness by himself.

"Your hands must be tired,” he said, reaching down and taking my left hand between both of his. I was so used to Ivar only saying kind things ironically, it took me a moment to realize he was actually trying to be sympathetic. He began rubbing his thumb into my palm slowly, and I tried to relax into his grip. His hands were thick with calluses, the familiar ones caused by gripping axe and bow, and others from the bite and grind of the leather bracers he wore to protect his skin when he crawled.

There was such tenderness in the press of Ivar’s strong hands. I knew I should not trust such an easy display of affection, but it was hard not to melt under the unexpected succor. The prince set his lips next to my ear, still massaging my hand. “Tell me, pet, how can I be more generous to you?”

We had a moment’s warning in the sound of soft footsteps outside the door, but Aslaug was pushing through it before we could move apart. “I think I left my spindle in here, Ivar,” she was saying as she entered the room. She paused for only a moment, taking in the postures of our bodies on the bed, mine fully clothed and above the blanket, her son’s still below it. My hand in Ivar’s, our faces so close. She smiled in an amused and proud sort of way, then looked away from us and started searching through the bags hanging from the walls. “Are you feeling better, Ivar?” she asked without looking back.

I tried to roll away but Ivar kept his grip on my hand. “I am, Mother,” he answered her but kept looking at me. “Sigrunn has great power in her hands, I think.”

“Does she,” Aslaug replied, sounding a touch more cold. “Are you ready to come out, and take a meal, then?”

“Do not rush us, Mother,” Ivar said, annoyance in his voice.

Aslaug stepped over to us then, giving Ivar a level look. “I am not going to leave this room and just allow you to lay about with girls,” she said with a hint of a smile, “in _my_ _bed_ , if that is what you are expecting right now.”

My face colored and I finally got my hand away from Ivar. He scowled up at his mother and looked like he was about to argue the matter further.

“I am sorry,” I said quickly, coming up to my knees and backing off the bed as a sharp shame rose in my throat, “I should not have… nothing happened,” I squeaked at Aslaug.

“I know, child,” she said indulgently. “But you may leave, now. Go fetch your things, Brynhilde has finished setting that beautiful indigo dye from the market and we are spinning today.”

I spared one last glance for Ivar before I walked out. His eyes were longing, plaintive, and promising. He wanted something from me that he was sure to try and collect before he left for England. But I would be left to wonder when that would happen, and exactly what it would be.


	5. somewhere we won't be disturbed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Explicit scene ahead!

Ivar caught me alone on my way down to the market after the sun started descending toward the horizon that day. He must have overheard me announcing my intention to catch the seller of sweetmeats before he went home for the night. I turned a corner down the winding lane and the prince was sitting on a barrel, a wolfish smile lighting up his face when he recognized me. The emotion in his eyes was masculine, primal. His knife was bare in his hands, he had been idly trimming his fingernails. He bristled with the intentions his eyes had merely hinted at this morning. He beckoned me with one hand as he sheathed the knife and dropped smoothly to the ground, entered the dark building behind him. He did not even look to see if I followed.

I did consider continuing on my way. Word had come up to the hall that Ragnar’s little fleet would be leaving for England in two days, and if I kept walking perhaps I could have kept myself free of his son, and kept my honor intact. But the thought of Ivar putting his hands on me in a dark room turned my spine to jelly and my feet were carrying me through the doorway before I even noticed.

It wasn’t a house. It looked like perhaps a workspace that no one had used in a while. The light of the overcast sky barely penetrated the room in back that Ivar had just slithered into. I wondered if he meant to use that knife again, or if he had some new torment planned for me. I swallowed hard against my rising nerves and I followed him.

Ivar was sitting up on a pile of fresh hay covered with a few old but clean-looking blankets. He had been preparing.

“What is this place?” I asked him, hugging my shawl around my shoulders more tightly.

“Somewhere that we won’t be disturbed,” was all Ivar would say. He held his hand out and I went to him, stomach churning and wetness already forming between my thighs. He raised my hand to his lips as I sat down beside him. “I want everything from you, before I go to England,” he said over my knuckles.

“Everything?” I asked, anxiety coursing through me like a blow from my father’s belt.

“Everything,” he affirmed, kissing the inside of my wrist, pulling me closer to him. He didn’t look like he was in the mood to talk.

“I cannot.” Freewomen could do as they liked, and slaves did whatever they were told, but I was a princess and there was more meaning to my maidenhead than to theirs. “I will not risk becoming with child. Even rumors of a dalliance…” I shook my head. “My father would be very displeased with me.”

“If you are not for a son of Ragnar Lothbrok, then who are you for?” Ivar said.

“It is my duty to let my father decide that,” I said, “he has reminded me of this all my life. He is an ambitious man, and there are many alliances to be made.”

He had asked me, but Ivar didn’t seem to be listening to my answer. His face was darkening. “At least tell me,” he said through gritted teeth, “which of my brothers,” his fingers closed around my arm, squeezed so hard I feared he’d leave bruises, “you are trying to save yourself for.” He was leaning over me now, his anger even heavier than the weight of his upper body pushing me down into the hay.

“Ivar, no,” I protested with wide eyes. “I don’t… I’ve barely even spoken to your brothers! I harbor no secret hopes for a marriage.”

“None?” he asked, mouth twisting into a self-deprecating smile. “No will of your own, no desire to control your own fate? I suppose I should have guessed that, after what you let me do to you.” Ivar gave me a squeeze where he knew the cuts were hidden under my sleeve, setting a sore pain blooming there again. “You will just allow yourself to be used by your father, sold off like a prized cow to buy himself a bigger kingdom. You are no better than a slave. I should use you like a slave.” He reached down through the space between my legs, the heel of his hand shocking the pleasure center there, then bunched my skirts in his fist and started dragging them up.

“Stop!” I commanded, surprising both of us with the force and gravity of my voice. We stared at each other, both breathing heavily. Ivar’s hand froze against my bare inner thigh, just beside my knee. “I am no slave,” I said ferociously. “I am not chattel. But I _am_ loyal to my father. I will not shame him.” Ivar’s finger twitched against my skin and I shuddered.

“But you want me,” Ivar crowed, refusing to admit defeat as he stroked me with one teasing finger. I closed my eyes and groaned. Why did he have to be so difficult? His hand started creeping up my leg.

“You will not take my maidenhead,” I repeated, eyes still squeezed shut. My body was already yielding, softening and opening to him. “But I will let you touch me. If you let me show you how I like to be touched.”

His hand stopped; when I opened my eyes he was scowling, full bottom lip thrust out in a pout. “You think that I do not know how to touch a woman?”

“No man does,” I replied with a gentle smile. The old wives at home had instructed me in more than just magic. “Not unless his woman shows him what to do.” I grinned at him playfully, trying desperately to change his mood. “We have many secrets.”

Ivar stared at me so intently his eyes seemed to glow. “Fine, you may show me,” he said, face relaxing suddenly. “I will not always do exactly what _you_ like, but it would be interesting to know these things.” He started drawing my skirts up again, cocking his head to the side in silent question.

I swallowed, put my hand on his to stop him, and closed my eyes. It was one thing to say it, and it was quite another to do this, to show the most personal parts of my body to another person. Especially someone that I did not feel particularly safe with. I exhaled slowly. “Remember, you wished to prove to me that you are not selfish.”

“Yes,” I heard Ivar whisper.

“That you can be kind,” I added. “Gentle.” I knew it was more than he had said, but it was what I needed from him in this moment.

Ivar surprised me by pressing his lips to my cheek. “Yes,” he repeated. I opened my eyes, and the softness in his face made me dizzy. He watched me closely as he pulled my skirts up until they were bunched up above my hips. I was bare to the world, but Ivar did not yet look down. He dropped his fair face closer. “We will not be discovered,” he said in a low, reassuring voice. “No one ever comes in here, I have checked. What have you to show me, Sigrunn?”

No “pet,” this time. He really was taking me seriously. I reached my arm down, placed my hand over my sex. Ivar covered it with his own. He was so warm. He was watching my face like he was about to receive the wisdom of the gods. I suppose in a way, he was.

I found I could not look at him and speak of these things at the same time, however. I pulled him down to kiss me, then buried my face in his neck. “There is a way that I touch myself at night, when I am alone in my bed,” I began. I slid my fingertip between the delicate folds of skin, found the sweet spot hiding inside and started circling it lightly. Ivar’s larger hand moved over me, feeling for what I was doing. His index finger slid over mine, rested lightly on top and followed my movements. My breaths were coming faster already.

“This is… above… your _kunta_? Not inside?” Ivar asked, sounding confused.

I tried not to giggle at him. Laughing at his inexperience would be very dangerous. “There is… a little bump right here… that feels so good,” I purred into his neck. I pulled my finger back to make room for Ivar to find it. I gasped when his rough fingertip slid against that hidden pearl; it felt entirely different when he did it. Excitement jolted through me.

His finger was clumsy. He ran on and off the right spot, trying to get his bearings. He was pressing a little too hard, and the delicate skin was chafing. I stopped him with my hand. “Gentler,” I urged him.

“Can I look?” Ivar asked me, withdrawing his hand entirely. Reflexively I replaced it with my own, soothing the frustrated nub with my own expert touch.

I nodded, but I bent my leg, lifting my knee shyly to shield myself from his view as Ivar slid down beside me. His hand stroked up my shin, then I felt him lay a kiss on the inside of my knee as he made a small, soothing sound. “Let me see,” he urged softly, bending my leg out of the way, settling my knee over his lap.

I peeked at his face just once. His eyes were wide and dark, lips parted in excitement. I couldn’t help but go back to the slow circles that always sent waves of pleasure rippling through my body, magnified fivefold now by the knowledge that Ivar’s eyes were upon me. It was hard to stop, and go back to instructing him. “Do you see it?” I finally asked, lifting my finger away again.

Ivar leaned closer, breath falling heavily on the skin of my thigh. “Yes,” he said, then reached his hand up slowly, fingers splayed like I was almost too sacred to touch. “Show me more.”

I slid my fingers down my slit, every sensation heightened under the weight of Ivar’s eyes. I dipped my fingertip between my inner folds to pick up some of the moisture gathering at my entrance; lingered there, sliding up and down along those slick lips. I wondered how Ivar’s cock would feel if he were to press it there. I realized I was rocking my hips against my own hand and making soft little moans. I drew my fingers back up, splitting them around the sides of that pleasure nub, and then pressed back down on it. “It all feels good, but the best is right here,” I explained, making myself shudder as I batted my finger over that sensitive flesh more quickly.

Ivar shifted himself with a soft groan. “Keep doing that,” he urged. And still he did not touch me.

The burning pleasure under my finger was extending out to most of my body and starting to peak when I felt the sudden press of cold metal against my thigh. I sucked in a breath and froze before looking down. Ivar had his knife out again. His other hand had disappeared inside his own pants.

“Keep going,” Ivar said, voice thick and strange. He went down on his side between my legs, shoulder coming to rest snugly against my other knee. Wedging his body to prevent me from closing my legs. His lower arm was working a steady rhythm inside his breeches, the upper sliding the flat of his blade up one of my legs and down the other. It was impossible to look away from that hypnotic movement, to lay back and continue what I had been doing. But when Ivar looked up at the apprehension in my eyes I could see his pleasure deepening. He wanted me just a little bit afraid, and as before I was enjoying it too.

I trusted him more this time, which allowed me to stay in touch with the ecstasy still eager to crest under my hand. When Ivar drew the first shallow cut down my inner thigh, my _kunta_ clenched and my face started tingling. He matched it on the other side and I wailed.

He returned his blade to the first side. He was stroking himself more frantically, now. The knife was only a hand’s breadth away from my aching entrance. I wanted more than anything for him to put it down and plunge his fingers inside me instead. I could not bring myself to ask for it, but the mental image took me right up to the brink of a climax promising to be far more intense than anything I had achieved alone in my bed. Ivar drew the sharp blade down my inner thighs over and over again, each time a little closer to my center. I was making strange sobbing noises and rubbing myself almost savagely when the ecstatic warmth consuming me finally crested, breaking like the wave of a terrible storm and wringing a cry out of me that people passing in the street could probably hear.

Ivar dropped the knife. His hand clamped down around my leg, fingers spasming. I looked down at him just in time to see his eyes squeeze shut, then fly open as his own pleasure took him. His body seized a few more times, then he collapsed his head onto the pillow of my thigh.

Ivar was still for longer than I expected. I straightened the leg he was not laying on, closing myself from his view. Tentatively, my hand crept down and I raked my fingers lightly through his hair. I held my breath to see how he would take it; Ivar sighed and tipped his head toward me in contented pleasure. I indulged myself in running my fingers over his scalp, playing with his hair and stroking the smoothness of his brow, as I had been longing to since our reunion. I had only been in Kattegat a week, but it felt like so much longer. The Fates were spinning me up in something I did not fully understand, but I knew I already was not the same girl I had been when I arrived.

I could see Ivar’s eyelashes flickering under his brows, his eyes focused on the cuts he had inflicted, only inches away from where he rested. “Do they hurt?” he asked, his breath tickling my skin and awakening my awareness of my legs again.

“Not too terribly,” I answered. I feared what it would feel like when I tried to move, though. “Is there… a lot of blood?”

“Not a lot,” he assured me, tracing his fingers over my leg just above the line of cuts. I started to push my skirt down, feeling self-conscious of my nakedness again. “Wait,” Ivar said. “Let me clean you up.”

He pushed himself up, paused to hold my gaze. “You have pleased me so well, pet.” He dropped his lips to kiss one of those thin red lines. It stung now, and I shuddered. His lips curled up, still enjoying my pain.

“Is this another claim you’ve made?” I asked, referencing his words the last time he drew my blood.

Ivar smirked. “This one was just for fun. But if it scars, you will always remember who did this to you.” He gave me that smug, arrogant look again, the one that said I was nothing but his toy.

“Did you mean to draw the rune Algiz yesterday? Did you put magic in it?” I had to know.

Ivar walked himself over my body, hands on either side of me. He brought his face next to my ear. “Yes,” he whispered then. “I told the gods that you belong to me and I bade them protect you for me while I am gone.” I shivered, unsure if I wanted that spell to have worked.

I wondered whether he wanted me for his wife, or just a pet as he said. If I gave in, gave him all of me, would it be the beginning for us, or the end? I dared not ask him.

Ivar turned, dragged himself over to a table that held a jug and a few folded cloths. He had planned to draw blood from me, it seemed, and to care for me afterwards.

It stung when Ivar pressed the cloth to my wounds, but the cool wetness did feel soothing. I was surprised by how much red stained the light fabric after he wiped the back of my legs where the blood had trickled, but I tried not to think about it. There was one cut on my left thigh that he had to hold for a long time before the bleeding would stop. Ivar never once mocked me or complained; tended to me patiently, almost with reverence.

_This is not what I thought love would look like._ The thought strayed idly across my consciousness as I watched Ivar dab at the wounds he had inflicted on me. I shot up onto my elbows. I did not want to be thinking that way; the more rational part of me knew there was something deeply wrong with that idea.

Ivar looked up at my movement, flashed me a reassuring smile. “Almost done, pet.”

I shoved my skirt down to finally cover my sex, leaving only the leg he was working on still exposed. This was not love, what was passing between us. I had to remember that Ivar was not to be trusted, and I could not allow myself to become tied to him, ensnared by him. I deserved better than a cruel man who could sometimes pretend to be kind.

When he finished, Ivar pressed one more kiss inside of my propped-up knee, closing his eyes with all the appearance of tenderness. Then he leaned his cheek there, turning to look at me with flashing eyes. “I have learned much today. I will make sure to show you what a good student I am, before I leave for England.”


	6. it has to be you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: pushy about sex, not taking no for an answer

I did not see Ivar that night, nor at breakfast the next day. Likely he was busy with his father, preparing for their journey, but his absence still stung me. It seemed to hurt his mother, too; Aslaug’s face was puffy and we all pretended not to notice when she had to hide wet eyes behind her hand. She steeled herself by the afternoon, especially when Ubbe and Sigurd returned from their hunting trip with a large doe strung between them.

Ivar and Ragnar were to leave in the morning. Aslaug had not prepared a sacrifice to send them off, as she had for Bjorn and Hvitserk less than a week before. She had the venison from her sons’ hunt prepared for dinner tonight, and a traveling _skald_ was set to perform in the great hall after, but these were all things she had already been planning. She did not even speak of the departure of her husband nor of her beloved youngest son.

Ivar came in to the hall with his two brothers just as dinner was being set. Ubbe and Sigurd were talking over each other animatedly, telling him the story of how they took the deer down, each trying to belittle and mock the other’s part in it. Aslaug and I waited for them by the table; Ivar looked up and smiled at me as he approached on his hands. It was a surprisingly simple smile, free of any teasing or implications. He simply looked happy to see me, and I found I was mirroring that expression on my own face.

“Princess Sigrunn!” Ubbe greeted me jovially as he reached the family table first. “Come congratulate the best hunter at Kattegat!” Then he picked me up and swirled me around in his arms. He smelled quite strongly of ale. I giggled as he set me down, but made sure to slip out of his grip.

“In that case she should be congratulating me,” Sigurd called, pulling me by the hands away from the elder brother, “for I was the one who killed the beast, with an arrow through the eye.” The younger blonde drew me in and kissed me on the cheek politely.

“Only because I landed the first arrow in her haunches and slowed her down for you,” Ubbe argued back, then stepped over to greet his mother.

Ivar was crawling over to his chair, glaring at us now from under his heavy brows. He had not missed the way they both had touched me; I pulled my fingers from Sigurd’s hands but Ivar’s face did not relax. “I am glad your hunt was so successful,” I said, “and I am certain you both shot magnificently.” As I spoke I stepped around the table to deliberately take the chair next to Ivar’s. I did not care to inflame his jealousy any further. When he settled in his chair I bent to greet him with a soft kiss on the cheek, my lips lingering perhaps a touch longer than necessary. “And how was your day, Ivar?” I asked politely.

As I straightened, Ivar’s hand slid along my waist. He left it on my hip, thumb drawing little circles, as he answered me. “All the preparations have been made. While these fools have been out playing with each other in the woods,” Ivar sneered, turning to make sure everyone was listening, “Father and I have gathered a fleet sure to exact retribution on those traitorous English.”

Sigurd was staring at the way Ivar’s hand lingered on me. I stepped away as if I hadn’t noticed it, and sat down in my chair. “I went down and saw this ‘fleet’ today,” Ubbe said, reaching for the bread at the center of the table and breaking off a piece. “It was looking just a little sad, brother.” The slaves approached then to serve us with platters of meat and jugs of ale.

I saw Ivar’s hand clench around the edge of the table.

“Our brothers took all of the best men south with them,” Sigurd added, spearing a chunk of meat on his knife. “You are fooling yourself. What are you even going to do when you get there, with only old men and farmers?”

“Father has a plan,” Ivar said through clenched teeth. “He always does. And the gods are with him.”

“No, Ivar,” Aslaug said, low and grief-stricken. Everyone turned at her tone. “They are not.” Her voice broke on the last word, eyes round and plaintive as she looked up at her youngest son.

I could not see Ivar’s face as he met her gaze, but his hand came up in a dismissive gesture.

Aslaug turned her face from us, pushed herself to standing. “I cannot—“ she muttered, almost to herself, then left us in the direction of her bedroom.

We were all silent for a moment. “Has she had a vision?” Ubbe asked Ivar.

“She is overreacting,” was all Ivar would say, and refused to look up from his food.

The lighthearted mood the brothers had walked in with was dampened for a while, especially with Ivar’s face turned black and brooding. But drink was still surging through the veins of Ubbe and Sigurd, and more ale was flowing. By the time the meal was mostly finished the conversation had turned more pleasant. Ubbe was making eyes at me from across the table, as I pretended not to notice and hoped that Ivar would not see.

“Have you been enjoying your stay at Kattegat so far, Princess?” Ubbe asked me with a genial smile. “I am sorry for not being around these past few days, to help you get more comfortable.”

“Do not bother yourself, Ubbe,” Sigurd scowled, glaring at me and then him, “your flirting is wasted. You were not with us the last time she was here. This one only has eyes for our brother Ivar, though I have no earthly idea why.”

I shifted uncomfortably. It would not be politically expedient to give the impression I was involved with any of the Ragnarssons while my father was away. “Your mother has made me quite welcome, Prince Ubbe, thank you for asking,” I said, trying to step over Sigurd’s comment.

“Perhaps it is because she can see that only one of us has any kind of courage or ambition,” Ivar said to Sigurd, spreading his arm wide and then settling it on the back of my chair.

I desperately wished Aslaug were still here. She would have known how to head this off.

“I don’t want either of you cowards bothering Sigrunn while I am away raiding in England,” Ivar said imperiously, twisting the tip of his knife idly into the table. “She is mine, do you understand?”

Ubbe’s eyebrows almost met his hairline in reaction to those words. Sigurd leaned forward, voice dripping with disgust. “Oh yes, because that went so well the last time, when you tried to claim the slave.”

My stomach flipped. I should not care, a slave was nothing, but the sink of envy drained all the strength from my limbs anyway. I wondered which one she was.

I felt Ivar shrink beside me, too. Something about this story had touched a nerve. Sigurd turned to me. “Do not bother yourself with my brother, Sigrunn. He likes to talk big, but I assure you, he has nothing to offer you.” Sigurd’s face was twisting in spite, and I felt my hackles start to rise on Ivar’s behalf. “If he even comes back from England,” Sigurd continued as Ivar leaned forward baring his teeth at him, “I think you would find him very disappointing.” Sigurd sat back with an ugly smile I wanted to slap off his face. “I doubt he can do much for a woman, anyway.”

“He can do plenty,” I snapped, then clapped my hands over my mouth. Ivar’s grimace turned to a triumphant grin, and he leaned closer to me. Now it was Sigurd’s turn to be speechless, turning the implications of my outburst around in his mind. “Not that I agree Ivar has any claim over me,” I continued, launching myself hastily into the things that had to be said. “My hand is only my father’s to give.” I shifted in my seat and became aware of a pleasant ache from the cuts on my thighs. Like my body had to remind me in this moment of the claims Ivar had already staked.

“But you can spend your time with whomever you like, until you are married,” Ubbe pointed out. “You are no prudish Christian.”

“I will not be subject to gossip and entanglements, which might complicate my marriage prospects,” I insisted, though I felt like I was losing this battle. None of Ragnar’s sons seemed interested in being persuaded to leave me alone.

“I will ask your father for your hand when he returns,” Ivar interjected irritably, as if this were perfectly obvious, “after I have come back victorious from England, having surpassed all my brothers in the glory of battle.” Then Ivar put his hand over mine on the table, threading his fingers in between my own, but he was looking at his brothers. “The point is, the two of you are not to touch her while I am gone.”

So caught up in the argument, it took me a moment realize that Ivar had just stated his intention to marry me. I didn’t know whether to be ecstatic or horrified. His fingers felt so good laced between my own, but there was a rushing in my ears as I stared at our hands, and for some reason I remembered that moment when he threatened to throw me off the cliff.

Ubbe and Sigurd exchanged a look. “I will do whatever I please while you are gone,” Sigurd said churlishly to Ivar. Then he took a big swig of his ale and watched me over the rim of the cup as I extracted my hand from Ivar’s grip.

Ivar’s eyes were icy as he scowled back at Sigurd, but Ubbe spoke before he could respond. “So are you two really…?” Ubbe asked me, waving his fingers in some meaningless yet evocative gesture.

I said “No,” just as Ivar said “Yes.”

Ubbe looked only at me. “Do you favor Ivar?”

I wasn’t ready for the question. Everything with Ivar was so strange, seductive and horrifying at the same time, and it had happened so quickly that I had not been able to sort out my feelings about him. “I… do not know yet,” I said lightly, choosing a coy act to buy myself some more time. It was politically dangerous to even be having this conversation. My father might wish to marry me to one of the other brothers, or some enemy of Ivar’s one day. Knowledge of an affair could make things horribly awkward, or be a reason for some suitor to find me unacceptable. My father had always cautioned me so.

I made myself look at Ivar. Betrayal was stark in his eyes. “The Princess still needs some convincing, I see,” Ivar said, twisting his head in that way he did when he was choking on bitter rage. He was addressing his brothers but he never took his eyes off of mine. “That is alright.” He leaned in closer to my face. “I can make her love me even if her father marries her off to one of you.”

I shuddered, probably visibly. Ubbe came to my rescue. “Can’t you see how uncomfortable you are making her, Ivar?” he chided. “Sigrunn doesn’t want to hear us talking like this.”

Ivar held my gaze with narrowed eyes for an endless moment longer, promising to make me pay for this humiliation later. I am ashamed to say heat rose from my sex at the prospect. Then the vengeful prince turned abruptly back to his brothers, plastering a cold smile across his face. “Very well then, what shall we talk about? Perhaps what you two layabouts plan on doing with your summer while the men are all out raiding?”

I shrank into myself, barely listening to conversation as the brothers turned their bickering to other topics. No matter what else had passed between us, Ivar still terrified me. The true horror of it was, though, that the fear never caused me to recoil. Somehow it drew me instead, right into the jaws of the beast.

Ivar did not try to speak to me again, but he sat at ease with his hand resting on the back of my chair, his positioning a reminder to me and to his brothers that he felt he had won the issue whether we chose to admit it or not. In my heart I knew it was true too, and dared not speak again lest that truth somehow squeeze itself past my lips. _I am his._

The townspeople were starting to enter the hall anyway, getting ready for the _skald’s_ performance. The slaves were stoking up the central fires and the benches down the rest of the hall were filling with bodies of all ages. The storyteller had been traveling down the coast since spring, sharing his tales of gods and heroes in exchange for hospitality. Aslaug had reappeared from her room, looking majestic and ageless again, greeting guests and making sure everyone was settled in. She did not rejoin us at our table; she sat at a bench close to the fire amongst the peasants, and had found one of the village children to clutch to her lap as the _skald_ began his performance. She barely even glanced at Ivar.

Ubbe and Sigurd had turned their chairs to face the storyteller. Ivar and I were already facing the right way on the far side of the table, which was still scattered with dishes that we occasionally picked at.

This _skald_ was… mediocre. The villagers loved it of course, but I had seen countless performers at my father’s court, and this one lacked the range to really bring all of the characters of the great legends to life. Ivar may have been feeling the same way; he shifted and sighed through the first few tales. Or perhaps he was simply brooding over the list of slights and insults he had accumulated today.

He caught me looking at him, leaned his head toward me to speak quietly under the voice of the storyteller. I inclined toward him to listen and he grabbed my arm, pulling me closer. “You could have helped me out there, in front of my brothers,” he growled into my ear. “Instead you made me look like an ass.”

I drew a deep breath. I couldn’t keep pretending nothing was happening, or that I wasn’t already entangled with Ivar now. Which meant I had to find my backbone. “I have told you,” I hissed back, “that we cannot appear to be involved. It could ruin—“

“Yes, yes,” Ivar said, cutting me off, “your father, political marriages, all of that.” He pulled me to look at him. “Do you not at least… want it to turn out to be me?” The arrogance, the anger, the cruelty, they were all gone from his face. What was left was the vulnerable core of Ivar Ragnarsson, the crippled boy who wondered if anyone saw a single thing of value in him. In that moment I loved him.

My head started nodding before I found my voice. “I do,” I whispered. A tentative, joyful kind of hope rose in his earnest face. “I do hope that it is you he chooses for me.” And my chest clenched as I realized how unlikely that was to be. Ivar was the youngest son, all of them unmarried, and it did not seem realistic that he would prove himself over them in battle, given the condition of his body.

His hand clasped itself in mine again. “Then give yourself to me tonight,” Ivar urged, eyes shining brilliant blue as he implored me with a dazzling smile. “I do not want to face mortal danger without…” he stopped himself, let me fill in the rest. Had he never been with a woman before? Or did he mean that he did not want to die without making love to _me_?

“I cannot,” I said again. I clenched his hand tightly, but I turned back to watching the _skald_. My heart was racing, but I was resolute. I would not betray my father’s wishes.

Ivar pulled my hand into his lap, pressed his forehead to my temple to keep murmuring in my ear. I grew nervous someone would turn around and see us like this. “You must come to bed with me tonight,” he said, and began laying gentle kisses around the shell of my ear. “Please, Sigrunn, it has to be you…”

I turned to look at his face. Never had I ever expected to hear Ivar Ragnarsson say ‘please.’ Especially not to me.

Looking directly at him was a mistake. I felt myself melting under those gorgeous eyes, the mouth that I never wanted to stop kissing me. “Please have mercy,” I heard myself saying, “I want to, and I cannot.”

The self-satisfied smile crept back onto his face then; he could smell his eventual victory in my words. He pressed my hand to his manhood, straining against his pants. “I need you, Sigrunn,” he said, so much heat flashing in his face that I had to turn away. I snatched my hand away and he let me. I had never touched a man that way before. The unfamiliar shape felt burned into my palm.

Ivar slid closer to me. I expected him to continue to press me, but instead he was silent. He simply laid his shoulder against mine in a companionable slump, gave me one last crooked smile, and then turned his attention back to the performance I was pretending to watch.

The traveler was stumbling his way through my favorite tale, The Kidnapping of Idun, when I felt Ivar’s hand slide over my knee. I looked at him sharply, gasping just a little. He met my indignant eyes with a lighthearted grin. He put one finger over his lips and started pulling the fabric of my skirt up. The table, as well as the backs of his brothers, was between our bodies and the rest of the room. No one would see what that hand was doing.

Somewhat scandalized, I thought about what to say to stop the mischievous prince, but that tingling was starting in my core again, bidding me to stay silent. His hand was on my bare knee now, and starting to slide up between my thighs. I had completely lost track of what the storyteller was saying by the time Ivar’s fingers reached the curls of hair covering my mound, running through them playfully.

“Open your legs for me,” Ivar breathed into my ear. “Let me practice what you showed me yesterday.”

I groaned, loud enough that Ubbe turned to see what was happening. I gave him a panicked smile and dropped my eyes to the table, mortified.

“She doesn’t appreciate my sense of humor,” Ivar told him, covering for my odd noise and leaning slightly away. I was also grateful that he had stopped moving his hand.

Ubbe took in how closely Ivar was sitting to me. “Is my little brother bothering you?” he asked.

I gave him a weak smile and shook my head. His eyes lingered on mine a moment longer, then he turned back to face the storyteller.

Ivar’s fingers began dancing in the crease between my thighs again. “Come now,” he purred in my ear, “you don’t want me to have to spread them myself, do you?”

In that moment I did not doubt that he was willing to risk making a scene to get what he wanted. We both knew it was a kindness on his part that he was being this discreet right now. Slowly, I relaxed and let my knees fall apart.

Ivar’s calloused hand ran down my inner thigh, taking his time now that he knew he was going to have his way. He traced his fingertips over each and every scabbed line he found etched into my skin there. My body was starting to tremble, and when his warm fingers brushed along my wet entrance, I was already desperate for him. We stared straight ahead, side by side, pretending to care about the storyteller as Ivar explored me. I knew I wasn’t brave enough to ask him if he had ever touched a woman like this before, but I wondered. His fingers did not feel clumsy, but they did seem very curious. He slid them through every fold and secret corner, though he did not try to push past my maidenhead.

I was breathing deep and long when Ivar focused his clever fingers on the pleasurable little nub I had shown him. Heat flooded both my face and my groin as I struggled to hold still and remain silent; I was feeling things in front of all of these people that I had only ever done to myself before, alone in my furs in the middle of the night.

I risked a glance at Ivar’s face. His eyes were like the stormy sea now; deep and ready to drown me. If I looked at him too long, what was happening under the table would become too obvious. But I felt as though nothing could tear me away.

He was searching my face as well, while his fingers continued to press slow circles into my clit. I bit my lip to keep from moaning. There was a deep tension building, in my legs and in my stomach, and I knew that I could not keep still and silent much longer.

“Ivar…” I whispered, reached up and clutched his face. He seemed surprised, then relaxed and allowed it.

I pressed my cheek to his. “I cannot take this much longer, not without giving us away,” I whispered heatedly into his ear.

Ivar made a pleased humming sound and sped up the movement of his fingers. My body spasmed.

“Please, Ivar, your brothers, your _mother,_ they are right here.” He slowed at that, and immediately I ached in frustration.

I made up my mind. “Meet me.” His fingers slowed further as he listened. “I will pretend I have to relieve myself and go out. Come find me behind the hall.”

“You know where my bed is, yes?” Ivar countered.


	7. between the furs

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mind the new tags: trigger warnings for physical discipline, spanking, and breath play aka choking.
> 
> Are you ready to begin?

 

I realized that I was shaking as I made my way through the dim passages behind the great hall. No one had seen me turn left instead of right, heading toward the room where Ragnar’s sons slept. I was not nervous that we would be discovered; I was overwhelmed at the thought of what I had decided to do. Sex outside of marriage is not wrong in our culture, but the women of my home had taught me to always treat it with respect. Sometimes it can bind people in ways that are difficult to break, and they said this happened especially to the young. I was likely not making the wisest choice, but tonight I could make no other.

Four beds stood in a line in the boys’ roomy chamber. I couldn’t imagine how the brothers tolerated this much intimacy these days, now that they were men who argued with each other at every turn. How they must be chafing to go out into the world and establish their own households.

Ivar’s bed was the last in the row, pushed up against the back wall. I knew which one it was because when we were children I used to keep him company here, on those painful days when he could not tolerate getting out of bed. It was roomy, low to the ground, and covered with extra furs. My heart started to race as I imagined him laying down next to me in it, now.

I used the candle in my hand to light the small lamps on this end of the room until a comforting ochre glow dispelled the darkness and started to soothe my nerves. I was making this choice of my own free will. I did not want to let Ivar go to England without having everything from him, either. I did not know if I loved him; a large part of me still hoped I didn’t. But he made me feel ways that I had never expected a man to make me feel, and I knew that I wanted to feel everything he had to offer. I wanted him to be my first.

I sat on the edge of his bed, wood frame creaking softly under me, and smoothed my hands over my knees. He had asked me to wait for him here. I did not know how long it would be before he arrived. The soft light of the flames danced around the room, across the pale skin of my hands as I watched them stroking up and down my legs, over and over. Would he find me beautiful, sitting here in the flickering light?

He was taking longer than I expected. I had hoped Ivar would wait a while before slipping away after me, so that anyone who noticed would not make the connection. But it had seemed more likely he would try to make it obvious to his brothers what he was doing, and it did thrill me to imagine that perhaps he could not make himself wait, too overcome with desire for me.

I reflected upon how much I had put him off and hurt his pride today. Now that I was sure I was done resisting, I wanted to make my submission to his will perfectly clear, from the moment Ivar entered the room. _Wait for me in my bed._ I reached for the ties behind my back that held my dress snug to my waist.

I shivered a little as I undressed. It was not terribly cold, but I felt exposed once I began, hurried at the thought that Ivar might arrive before I had set the scene just how I wanted. I folded my dress and underclothes beneath the frame, and slid my naked body between the furs of Ivar’s bed.

The smell of him surrounded me as I settled in, spicy and unmistakable. I closed my eyes and breathed in deeply, almost feeling dizzy with it. I was actually here. In a moment, Ivar would be here too, with no barriers left between us. I felt aware of every inch of my own skin, the feel of his furs enveloping my body, stroking me gently with every wiggle and twist. The same furs that caressed him, night after night.

Would his touch feel just as tender? Ivar was impossible to predict. I hoped to see again the softness in his eyes that had shone out when he asked me if I wanted him to be the one that I married. I still wasn’t sure of the right answer to that question, but when he had looked at me with his heart laid bare like that it had given me hope. Hope that he was more than a selfish, calculating beast, fueled by rage and bitterness. Hope that I could burrow under all that pain and inside find a good man, who could love me and treat me well. I should have cursed that he inspired such hope; the most dangerous thing about Ivar of all.

I unbound my hair and arranged it in a careful spill across the pillows. In the candlelight it shone the color of precious gold, and I hoped it would please him. I wondered if Ivar would want to hurt me tonight. He had done so each of the other times he had laid hands on me, so I supposed I should expect it. It occurred to me that the cruelty might be something that he needed, in order to enjoy himself fully. The thought did not bother me as much as it should have. I could not deny that I was enjoying it too; the pain was never overwhelming, and almost always enhanced the pleasure of his kisses.

I heard the soft dragging sound that could only be Ivar approaching the door. A shock of nerves ran through me, even though this was exactly what I had been waiting for. I forced my body to stay relaxed, head turned to the side, hair pouring like molten gold over the edge of the pillow. The furs shifted softly with the rise and fall of my breaths, already coming much too quickly, the subtle movement tickling the edge of the pelt against my bare shoulders.

The door opened. I saw only his undulating outline in the dimness as he slid through and closed it swiftly behind him. As he entered the pool of candlelight, Ivar met my eyes with a mischievous, promising grin matching the one he had given me when I left the hall. As he took in the little picture I had set for him, however, the smirk evaporated. He crawled to the edge of the bed with his eyes sobered and his jaw slack. “Sigrunn…” was all he could say, dumbstruck as he looked at me waiting for him like a gift.

I remained perfectly still as Ivar pulled himself up to his knees and rested his chest against the bedframe beside me. His first touch was to stroke my hair, his fingers weaving between the strands and tingling my scalp with every pass. “You truly wish to give yourself to me,” he marveled, staring down with eyes that sparkled like the waves in the cove on a sunny day.

I allowed myself to shift, then, nestling my head into his hand. “Yes, Ivar,” I whispered, closing my eyes against his brilliance for a moment.

When I opened them again, Ivar was staring at my shoulders, poking bare and creamy-white above the covers. His expression softened a touch more as he realized I must be naked. He reached out impulsively and grabbed the edge of the fur at the center of my chest, then paused, other hand still stroking my head. He gave me a searching look, took a breath as if he were about to speak, then slid the cover off my body in one slow, decisive drag.

I felt my nipples harden in the cool air as I watched Ivar look over my body. He had pulled the pelt down past my knees. His lips parted and his eyebrows drew apart as if what he saw almost hurt him. I had never bared myself before him all at once like this before, and I felt my cheeks begin to flush as his eyes ran over my belly and down to the dark triangle between my closed legs.

He let the fur go and I felt it slipping off my ankles. His hand wrapped around my knee, then slid softly up my leg, over my hip. He still wore his gauntlets so the pressure was light and focused in his fingers. They ran around my hipbone, danced over my stomach. I shifted, felt myself arcing into his hand. He looked up into my face again, pupils blown wide, the black threatening to overtake the blue. I could not stay still any longer. “Take off your clothes and come embrace me,” I begged him, my head lifting toward him and my hands coming to the buckles that held the bracers to his arms.

Ivar smiled with one corner of his mouth as he helped me remove his gauntlets. When they were free he leaned forward, capturing my lips so insistently that he pushed my head back against the bed. His jaw worked over mine as he cupped my cheek with his now-bare palm. I opened my mouth to him, inviting his tongue to press inside. He tasted like honey tonight, they must have been passing mead around after I left. I curled my hands around the back of his neck, played with the close-shorn hair at the base of his skull, but after a moment it wasn’t enough. I stretched my arms down his back, tried to pull him closer to me, fingers clawing into the wool of his tunic.

Ivar broke off his kiss with a chuckle. “So eager,” he chided me, his teasing tone hiding a sharpness I might have only been imagining. He pulled back and I let him go, watching him ball his fists in the hem of his shirt. “When not even an hour ago it was ‘No, Ivar,’” he pulled both the tunic and his undershirt over his head in one quick movement, “‘Don’t, Ivar,’” his muscles rippled under his pale skin as he tossed the garments aside, “and what was the last one?” He leaned back in on his elbows, wrapped his hand around my jaw. “Ah yes. ‘Please show mercy, Ivar.’” He grinned darkly and twisted my face to the side, left me staring down the hard planes of his bare chest as his fingers dug painfully under my chin and he laid his lips to my ear. “Now what kind of Viking would I be if I showed you any mercy,” he said. Heat flooded my sex as he pulled at my earlobe with his teeth.

He released my jaw and pressed his hand down my throat, over my collarbone and around my right breast. His fingers pinched the nipple and I gasped, arching my back as he hummed into my cheek. His breaths fell heavily across my ear as he knelt by the edge of the bed and played with me, just a bit too roughly. “Ivar…” I moaned in warning. My fingers closed around his upper arms, caught between exploring the terrain of his biceps and trying to push him away.

“Did you not say you were giving yourself to me?” Ivar asked, catching my eyes with teasing look. “I am going to do whatever I please with you now.”

It did not seem worthwhile to point out that it had never not been that way between us. Besides, his next tug at my nipple was not as hard. He watched my face struggle and moan under his onslaught, one hand pinching and pulling at either breast. “Please, Ivar,” I begged when I could not take it any longer, “come lie with me.”

Ivar’s eyes gleamed with anticipation as he rolled both my nipples between his fingers one last time, making me throw my head back and groan. Then he was kissing my hand and reaching down to loosen his pants.

I saw him hesitate. He continued kissing my knuckles but his eyes were unfocused now. Darkening thoughts were chasing each other furiously, etching themselves across his brow. A nervous sort of confusion started seeping through my chest. What was wrong? His hand left his breeches, ties still secured.

“Turn over,” Ivar commanded, icy blue eyes focusing on mine again, the last vestiges of his earlier tenderness slipping out of them. “Get down on your knees here beside me.” He pulled on my arm, and I reminded myself of my resolve to submit to him entirely tonight. I wanted to give him whatever he needed. Ivar guided me down until I was kneeling alongside him, trying not to shiver without even a stitch of clothing to warm me. Ivar’s face was so cold it was frightening now, and I dared not look at him. What had I done?

His left hand ran down over my ass as his right lowered my head firmly over the bed. “You lied today,” I heard him say. “You told my brothers your heart did not already belong to me.” He was stroking the widest part of my bottom, making me supremely aware of how exposed I was, naked and bent over the bedframe. “My first thought was to beat you like a disobedient slave, with my belt.” His other hand tightened in the hair at the back of my head. “But I have decided that your error was innocent. You are only trying to be a good person, a good daughter.” His open hand clapped across my cheeks, surprising but not very painful. “So I decided I should discipline you like a child, with my hand.” The next blow was harder, and my body rocked into the bed. “Your first loyalty is to me, Sigrunn.” Crack. It didn’t even sound like he even believed what he was saying, just playing some kind of game. “You must remember that you are mine.” I missed the intimacy we seemed to have lost, but at least Ivar smoothed his hand over my skin after every blow. His caresses soothed the irritation and sent wave after wave of heat to that space between my legs, which he was coming closer and closer to touching.

His next blow landed too close to the previous strike, causing a much sharper pain and making me yelp. “Shhhh, you do not want to be discovered like this, do you?” Ivar asked, turning my head with that grip in my hair until I faced him. He watched my face twist as he struck the same spot a third time. I held my breath to keep myself quiet, then rolled my eyes up to him plaintively. His face still looked cruel, but heat was creeping back into his gaze and he seemed fully focused on me again.

Ivar guided my head back down to rest on the bed, then he released my hair and laid his own face close to mine, resting in the crook of his right arm. His left was still rubbing over my ass, in little soothing circles. He gave it another lazy slap and I winced but did not cry out.

“You are so beautiful like this,” he intoned, rubbing those little circles again. He dipped his fingers in between my legs and I did moan then, as he brushed things that were positively aching for his touch. Then he withdrew, and a second later his hand cracked down on my other cheek. Every time my face shuddered, his satisfaction seemed to increase. And every time, he rewarded me with another teasing stroke against my sex. “You would let me do anything to you,” he marveled. He slid one finger in between the lips of my slit. I sighed and pushed against his hand, urging him on. I could feel how slippery I was down there, and I knew I was ready for more. Something deep passed behind his eyes as he watched me wriggle helplessly in my desire for him. “Get back into my bed, woman,” he growled.

I climbed up eagerly, saw from the corner of my eye that Ivar was pushing at his pants, struggling to get out of his shoes quickly. I took advantage of his distraction to pull his fur cover back up and over my body. When he was undressed Ivar took my head in his hands and kissed me, slow and deep. He kept his face close when he broke off the kiss to pull himself into the bed. He got himself under the covers without letting me see his lower body, more shyness showing in his face than he probably realized.

I turned my body towards him under the furs, reached out to embrace him. The more vulnerable he looked, the more I wanted to reassure him, and these moments of hesitation were melting my heart toward him. I pulled his body close to mine as I kissed my way up to his ear. “I want it to be you, Ivar, who first conquers me,” I whispered there.

He groaned and pushed his cheek against mine, moving my head until he could look me in the eyes again. “I want you too, Sigrunn,” he said, with clear eyes and earnest voice. “You make me feel—“ he shook his head, tried again. “I didn’t think—“

“Am I your first, as well?” I asked, saving him from having to say it. He looked like he was considering dissembling for a moment, then his face collapsed. “Yes,” he confessed. “Does that disappoint you?”

“No,” I whispered with a reassuring smile, grasping his face and preparing to kiss him again. “I told you, a man knows nothing unless his woman shows him.”

“And what will you show me tonight?” Ivar asked with a smirk, hand already traveling down my body.

“No more demonstrations,” I said against his lips, nipping at him hungrily between words. “Now we find out together… what feels right.”

Ivar’s fingers were at my entrance again. “Get on your back,” he coaxed, and propped himself up over me. He dipped his fingertips over my opening, and they came back slick and soothing as he drew them over that spot I had been aching for him to get back to, starting back in with the rhythmic press that had been driving me mad out in the great hall.

I buried my face in his chest and groaned his name, so grateful to not have to hide my reactions this time. I clutched at him, nestling in his strong arms as my legs started to shudder, the pleasure of his hand so intense. I sighed almost in relief when he stopped, slid his fingers down through my slick folds again. I did not need this to be over so soon. “Ivar, will you…” I started to ask, trailed off in sudden shyness.

“Anything,” he whispered, then watched my face as he waited for me to continue. His fingers slowed but did not stop, gliding up and down over all the sensitive flesh between my legs.

I closed my eyes and hummed in pleasure for a moment, before I could gather myself to speak. “I was told it will be easier for… for you to take me, the first time,” I stuttered, “if you readied me by…” he was hanging intently on my every word, his open face almost too beautiful to bear. I had to look down at his chest to finish my sentence. “If you stretched me with your fingers, first.”

Ivar made some kind of desperate, terribly aroused noise and slid his digits down to my opening. “Like this?” he asked, pressing against me eagerly. The sensation was much more overwhelming than I expected, a blunt sort of pain that felt incredibly satisfying at the same time.

“Wait,” I cried, and he stopped. I pulled on his wrist, brought his hand up in front of my face. “This may help,” I said, then sucked his first two fingers into my mouth, staring at him the whole time. Ivar made that pained face again, like I had stabbed him with pleasure. I swirled my tongue to make sure his fingers were fully wet, then released him. “And start with just one.”

Ivar groaned and covered my mouth with another kiss as he reached carefully back down between my legs. I felt the pad of one finger slide over my inner lips, then slowly started making its way between them, sparking a new fire with every inch he gained. I had never felt anything like this. The few times I had explored myself in this way it had felt either irritating, or like almost nothing at all. Ivar’s touch had my whole body enflamed, and my _kunta_ welcomed him hungrily as he plumbed my depths.

I felt his knuckle hit skin, preventing him from pushing any farther. His lips were parted and he was breathing as hard as I was. “Now what?”

I closed my eyes and rolled my hips, slowly. A deep pleasure vibrated through my being as I rotated around the axis of his finger. I pressed my forehead into his chest again and moaned. “Movement,” I choked out to him. I was losing my ability to think of words. Ivar pulled his finger back slowly, then pressed it into me again as I made encouraging noises. I clutched at him as he pumped in and out. There was a rushing in my ears as I tried to get used to the unfamiliar sensation, a pleasure so fierce I could not keep myself still, so sharp that I almost wanted it to stop.

Thankfully, the intensity faded as my body adjusted, and Ivar must have felt me relax in his arms. “Do you want more?” he asked the top of my head, pressing tender kisses there.

I turned my face up to him. I almost didn’t want him to keep going, but if he were going to take me tonight I needed to be ready for something wider than just one finger. I nodded, eyes wide, and let him watch the second wave of burning pressure reflect in my face. The slide of two fingers was more than twice as intense as one, but watching the possessive smile that spread over Ivar’s face as he pushed my limits transformed the pain into something else. Something wonderful. A proud sort of happiness bubbled up in my chest, soothing me. Ivar noticed my struggle, he saw what I was going through for him, and he appreciated it. My pain was pleasing to him, and that made it transcendent.  

Then he started rocking those fingers inside of me and I could not keep my eyes open any longer. He was stretching me, as I asked him to, and all I could do was focus on the way the deep ache was fading slowly, slowly into a new kind of ecstasy. My world was nothing but his fingers inside me and his breath on my face.

Ivar rolled himself on top of me and started kissing the crook of my neck. His fingers kept pumping as his mouth traveled over my shoulder, across my chest, up to the peaks of each of my breasts. As he helped me relax in this way the intensity eased until I was sure that I was enjoying myself again. The movement of his fingers was stoking up the fire in me again now, the one that he had stopped on the brink of bursting over me twice now tonight. I moaned his name and rocked myself into his hand.

Ivar was kissing his way down my stomach. He rubbed his face just above my navel, then turned his chin up to me. “I want you to come for me just like this, Sigrunn,” he said. “What should I do?”

It amazed me that the prideful, incorrigible Ivar was now having no trouble asking for direction. He did it so simply, so matter-of-factly it did not even feel like he was giving me control at all. I simply had the information that was necessary for him to achieve his goals; he was giving up nothing by asking. “Keep your hand inside,” I said between gasping breaths, as the pace with which he was thrusting into me was only increasing, “and with the other… what I showed you yesterday.” I wasn’t sure if that was right, but the thought of feeling his touch in both places at once almost undid me right there.

Ivar slid his body down between my legs, wrapped his right arm over my hip and belly so that he could balance while reaching down to my center to attend me with both hands. His head rested on the crook of his elbow over my stomach, and I brought one hand up to tangle in his thick hair. I spasmed when the fingers of his right hand found my clit, then lay back as a high-pitched whine escaped me, squeezed out of me by the crashing wave ignited when Ivar pressed me in just the right way. It was impossible to remain silent then, all of the sensations from his fingers inside of me turned sweet and bright by the influence of that magic spot he was rubbing above.

“Ivar, I’m so close,” I called to him, letting go of his hair to run both hands through my own, trying to hold myself together. It was so strange, to be this close to orgasm under hands that were not my own. I had no control and I felt like I might burst out of my own skin. I looked down just once, to see Ivar’s blue eyes lidded with lust, thick with his own passion to be seeing me in this state. His face pushed me over the edge, and I screwed my eyes shut as my body seized under and around him. I felt like I was falling and would never find the bottom, white-hot currents sucking relentlessly at my core as Ivar’s fingers continued to move. Finally I landed; was able to press my hands over Ivar’s and bid him to stop.

We laid there like that, panting, for a few moments. The lust I had seen in his eyes was haunting me as I relearned how to control my limbs. When Ivar dragged himself up the bed alongside me, I pressed my hand to his chest and started sliding it down toward his waiting manhood. He had been so patient; more patient than I ever expected a man to be.

I was ready for him.

Ivar clutched at my hand suddenly, stopping me before I could reach his cock. “Sigrunn—“ he choked.

I looked up at him in surprise. Ivar’s face was pained, tormented. Apprehension, shame, and a fierce eagerness all competed in his eyes. “Do you not want me to touch you?” I asked, confused.

He barked out a strange laugh, squeezed my hand still trapped in his grip. “Yes. Gods yes. But…” he hesitated, playing with my fingers. “It seems in yet another way, the gods have seen fit to make me unlike other men.” He could not look at me, focused on watching our hands intertwine. “I thought with you it would be different. There were moments…” he sighed heavily, like he was giving up something. “It doesn’t work. I tried once, with a slave girl. I could not take her. She told me it was supposed to be… stiffer, to make it work.”

I took a deep breath, attempting to be even and careful in my reaction. Suddenly his starts and stops, his sudden shifts in mood all the times we had been together like this, took on a whole new meaning. “You said… there were moments, with me?” I asked.

Ivar looked up at me finally, blue eyes burning. “You inflame me, Sigrunn. When we are together… it is not like with the slave. But right now…” as he trailed off he looked over my shoulder, staring at nothing. His face began to harden in the despair that always preceded his frightening anger.

“Let me try,” I said softly, bringing my fingertips to his cheek, drawing him back in before he succumbed to bitterness.

He searched my face, confused and afraid to hope. “Try what?”

I put on a smile that I hoped was feminine and enticing. “Try and inflame you again. Let me touch it.”

Fear and excitement chased each other across his eyes, but when I rolled my body into his, his desire won out. He brought my hand back to his stomach, pressed it to his hipbone, my fingertips brushing thick hair below. Ivar took one more shuddering breath.

“No matter what happens, you have still satisfied me better than I ever thought possible,” I said, “and you are still the first man to have ever been inside me.”

The tension in his face broke just a little, and he gave my hand back its freedom.

I pressed my lips to his and reached down his body until I found something warm and soft. As I ran my fingers over it Ivar broke the kiss with a gasp. I pressed my face against his harder, refusing to let him pull away or resist this. I continued to explore him while I sucked his tongue into my mouth.

I had seen many men undressed of course, but this was the first time I had ever touched a man’s cock. I had not expected it to feel so smooth, and I felt positively compelled to stroke my fingers down his length, over and over. Ivar was making soft moans and pressing his hips in my direction. I felt myself becoming aroused again just at this evidence of his enjoyment. His cock was spongy and flexible, but I thought perhaps it was growing under my hand. I wrapped my fingers around it and squeezed, pulling away from his body as I did.

“Gods, yes, do that again, but harder,” Ivar murmured against my lips, clutching my shoulder in his strong hand.

As I milked him I could definitely feel him firming, the soft skin now dragging with my hand over a thickening core inside. Ivar pulled away from my lips to arch his neck and make a guttural noise in his throat. “Sigrunn, truly you are a gift to me from the gods themselves.”

I made a pleased noise and pumped him harder. It was the same sort of thing he had been saying to me since the first night he made me his plaything, but the words he was using were so much better now. Respectful, awe-struck. I liked Ivar like this. I liked holding him in my hands and knowing I made him happier than any woman ever had. He continued to grow for me, as his hands spasmed over my body and his teeth scraped against me in passion.

Ivar’s left hand brushed over mine as he reached down to check himself. His cock was now like one of the large ropes they use on boats, dense but still flexible. His larger grip crowded mine off of him as he gave himself a few practiced strokes, grunting in satisfaction.

“I do not want to wait any longer,” he whispered in my ear. “Get on your back, Sigrunn.”

I felt a flash of apprehension, even though this was the moment I had been readying myself for. I tried to remember every bit of giggling gossip I had overheard from more experienced girls, every piece of advice the old wives had given out about wedding nights and readying oneself for the act of love. I licked my fingers and rubbed them over the lips of my opening. Ivar spit into his hand and followed my lead, wetting his shaft. Then he pulled his body over mine, brilliant eyes boring into me with wicked anticipation.

I spread my legs, lifting my knees to angle myself completely open for him. Ivar reached down and I felt him pressing the head of his cock against my entrance. It was much wider than his fingers and I could not help but take a deep, apprehensive breath. Ivar bent his face over mine, restraining his enthusiasm for a moment. “Relax,” was all he said, but I saw his eyes asking _are you alright?_

When I exhaled, releasing some of the tension in my face, Ivar started pressing himself into me. The blunt pressure overwhelmed all other feelings and I squeezed my eyes shut, tried to focus on receiving him. His progress was terribly slowly; his cock feeling impossibly large. It was building to more pain than I wanted and my eyes flew open in warning. I was met by the vision of his face screwed up in a ferocious joy. The intensity of his eyes, both determined and delighted, silenced the cautions on my lips and I felt my body open to him further, yielding to Ivar the conqueror. The pain lessened and heat welled up in its wake.

When Ivar’s hips met mine and he was fully inside, he brought both his hands to my face, resting his full weight on top of me. I felt every inch of him burning inside my aching _kunta_ , but I no longer wanted it to stop. We stared at each other, mouths agape at the unfathomable mixture of emotions we were sharing. I shifted my hips just a fraction and the corners of his eyes creased, hinting at how overwhelming the pleasure was for him too. “Sigrunn…” he began, but even his clever tongue could not find any words for this moment.

Then he started to rock his hips. It was actually a relief; I sighed as the burn turned into a more satisfying ache as Ivar slid against inner walls stretched to their limit. His forehead dropped to mine, his eyes darkening again as he began taking his pleasure from me in eager thrusts.

As the initial rush faded, my body adjusted to his girth. After a while the pain was gone, and in its wake the experience felt much… less… than I had expected. The intense pleasure his fingers had given me was just not rising up from the slide of his cock. I wondered if he was supposed to be harder than this. I really had no way of knowing.

Still, I felt warm and tingly all over. Watching Ivar’s face slack with pleasure above me was reward enough; the emotion stirring in my chest was its own kind of unbearable as I watched him enjoy my body. I was giving this to him. I was enough for him. I relaxed into the soft joy flowing though my veins.

Ivar was pumping himself into me faster and faster, thrusting almost savagely with his hips. My eyes were closed, my face serene as I bounced under him. Truthfully even though I was not stirred to passion, I was relieved that the entire experience was not painful, as I had been warned it might be.

Ivar stopped. I opened my eyes to see roiling storm clouds in his darkened gaze. “You are not crying out, as other women do when men take them. Why am I not making you cry?”

It was a very dangerous question. It was hard to choose the right words to answer.

“It is still too soft, isn’t it.”

“I do not know, Ivar,” I said quietly, “I have never been with a man like this. I have no way of knowing what it is supposed to be like. You have already satisfied me so well the other way; all that I want right now is for you to take _your_ pleasure from me. That is all you need to think about.”

Ivar’s mouth twisted into a slight smile at my flattery, but he seemed distracted by his own thoughts yet. “ _My_ pleasure,” he echoed. He began to press his hips against me again. He dropped his face close to mine and began growling in time to his thrusts. “ _I_ want you overwhelmed, I want you struggling. I want to feel your very life in my hands.” His fingers slid along my collarbone and wrapped themselves around my neck.

He pressed only lightly at first. I could still breathe under the weight of his hand on my throat, but the air made a sound as it struggled through the narrowing passage. Ivar growled happily and started thrusting into me harder again.

After a moment he released the pressure but left his hand there, caressing the side my neck with his thumb. His hips continued to rock against mine as he watched my face carefully. _Will you allow me to do this to you?_ He wouldn’t ask me, but he was waiting for an answer.

I moaned and lifted my chin, presenting my throat to him wordlessly like an animal declaring its submission. His eyes flashed and he pressed down on me again, this time cutting off my breath entirely.

The world narrowed. I did not feel afraid, but I felt all at once entirely awake and focused on Ivar and the feelings he was creating in my body. He released me after a moment; my trapped breath rushed out in a moan and heat exploded in my _kunta_. I started pushing back into his pumping hips wantonly.

“You like that too,” Ivar observed with a satisfied chuckle. “Good.” He waited for my next breath and then clamped down on my neck again. I felt a hot pressure building in my face as he held that grip; I also started to feel his cock more sharply inside of me. When he finally let me breathe again he slammed both hands to the bed, bracing himself so that he could increase the strength of his thrusts. His face was overcome with need; I glimpsed it only a moment before I had to squeeze my own eyes shut, his cock reaching deeper inside me now and setting off another painful sort of pleasure. I let myself whimper under his onslaught, knowing that was exactly what he wanted.

Ivar’s pace was becoming frantic; I felt his hand clutch at my neck again. He was pressing so hard that I could not help but claw at his arm, attempting in vain to pull him off me. When he let me have another breath I saw his eyes were gleaming, like a wolf about to take its prey. Certainly he must be close to finishing, I thought. I can bear this a little longer. There was no doubt his cock had grown inside me now. I could feel it stabbing me at depths his fingers had not reached.

Ivar gripped my throat again and squeezed, tipping my jaw up and trapping all that hot blood in my face again. My eyes closed and my hands scrambled against him; I still trusted him but I could not control their desperate protest. He held on longer than he had before, my back arched and I bucked against him. I heard Ivar groaning in pleasure as my body started feeling strange, heavy and light at the same time. I couldn’t open my eyes. I felt like I was falling out of the bed, out of the room, somehow, though I could still feel his cock inside me and his hand on my throat. Then even those sensations faded, and the black consumed me.

 

The first thing I became aware of after that was the stroke of Ivar’s fingers threading slowly through my hair. He was lying beside me now, arms wrapped around my shoulders.

“There you are,” he said as my eyelids fluttered open. His face hovered over mine, looking satiated, loving, and more than half mad. I tried to swallow and coughed instead, my throat raw and sore. When my body shifted, I felt a warm trickle between my thighs. Ivar’s seed.

He stroked my hair until the coughing stopped. “You did so well, my love,” he hummed into the top of my head, cradling me into his chest. I burrowed my face there, still coming back to myself. Had Ivar just… almost killed me?

“How did I get so lucky, to have you come back into my life, Sigrunn.”

Had he meant to bring me so close to death? Or was it an accident?

His fingers traced over the scabbed rune still evident on my shoulder. The one that stood for protection. “I meant this. The gods had better keep you safe until I return.”

“You are the one they will have to worry about,” I replied, voice rasping more than I expected. He had called me his love. What would his love do to me next? “It is you who is leaving tomorrow, to face combat, and the sea…”

Ivar hugged me closer to him. “Perhaps you should give me something to protect me, too, then.” He pressed a kiss into my head. “Or at least something to remind me to think of you.”

I swiveled in his arms and looked up at him then. “Oh? Do you mean to say that without some trinket, you might just forget about me?”

Ivar looked like he was considering mocking me with agreement, then scooped a lock of hair out of my face with his finger. “Something to remind me of this night,” he said softly. “My journey will be cold and lonely.”

I stared back into his brilliant eyes as I thought about how to fill his request. I had nothing with me but the clothes I had worn to dinner. That felt like ages ago, now.

I rolled onto my back so I could free both my arms. Ivar let me go, but kept one warm hand underneath my back. He watched me silently as I twisted out a lock of hair from behind my ear and began carefully plaiting it.

If Ivar truly knew seiðr, I was about to give him great power over me. But hadn’t I already, in almost every way that mattered? He had frightened me again tonight, but still it was not enough to close my heart to him. “Where is your knife?” I asked when I was almost done.

Ivar rolled to his side, fished his hand around in the pile of clothes on the floor before coming back up with the weapon that I had come to know so intimately these past few days. He flipped it in his hand, showing off with a smirk. I smiled and held the little braid out taught for him.

Ivar settled back against my side. He cocked his head and trailed the tip of the knife over my breast, a playful smile on his face. I raised my eyebrow at him. _Are you not as exhausted as I am?_ Ivar flashed me a smile that actually held a hint of apology. He lifted the blade, bringing it carefully behind my ear to cut off the plait.

I took it from him and folded it in half, braiding the free ends of hair together as I mentally made my plea to the gods. _You seem determined to tie our fates together. Please keep Ivar safe and bring him back to me._ I looked back at my lover when I was done, and impulsively slid the looped braid over his blade. He admired it a moment, golden strands laying over the dark leather of the knife’s handle, then pressed it to his lips.

Ivar turned to place the knife on the ground beside the bed, then rolled back to me, pulling his warm fur cover up over both our bodies. He laid his head next to mine, put his hand to my face and pushed our foreheads together. His gaze was serious, but warm. He parted his lips as if he were preparing to speak.

We were interrupted by the sound of his brothers at the door, coming home to their beds. Instinctively I buried my head in Ivar’s shoulder, as he rolled to face the intruders with one arm wrapped tightly around me.

“Brother, you are still awake,” I heard Ubbe exclaim. Certainly it would be only a moment before they would notice my brazen hair spilling over Ivar’s chest.

“I did not expect you back so early yourselves,” Ivar said, then tipped his chin down to me. “Did you, Sigrunn?”

Of course he would make sure they knew who the girl in his bed was. I lifted my head and gave a sheepish smile to the shocked princes. Ivar was grinning at them, wide and proud.

“Princess!” Ubbe exclaimed, seeming entirely surprised.

Sigurd strode over to his own bed with a scowl. He gave me one long look, brimming with disgust, then began stripping off his heavy clothes. “I am tired,” he announced. “You two had better be finished; I want to be able to sleep tonight.”

Ubbe took a half a step closer to us, his brows knitting together. “This is not wise, Ivar. Her father is not someone we can afford to anger.”

Ivar stroked my back possessively. “Who is a better match for King Harald’s daughter than a son of the great Ragnar Lothbrok?”

“Ragnar’s sons are not all equally made,” Sigurd growled from under his covers.

Ivar rose up on his elbows to glare at Sigurd, loosening his grip on me. “Say that to my face, coward! Who is it again that is leaving to raid with our father in the morning?”

Ubbe approached Ivar, his hands placating. “Ignore him. All I am saying is that what Sigrunn said at dinner is still right. It is better for all of us if we keep this quiet.” He turned his face to mine. “Princess. Let me escort you back to your room. I will walk ahead and make sure that no one sees you leaving this side of the hall.”

I twisted under the covers, looking toward the pile of my clothes. “Ivar, would you give me—“

“Stay.” Ivar pulled me back against his chest, burying his hand in my hair. “Just in case the next pair of soft arms to embrace me belong to a Valkyrie, coming to take me to Valhalla.”

And not a one of us could begrudge him that.

 

 

**A/N: Thank you all so much for all the support and enthusiastic encouragement. This is the end of Part I. But since I don't want to leave you too empty, here's** **a Sneak Peak of Part II of Sigrunn's story: _Watch Me Drown_ , coming soon:**

I was finally starting to grow accustomed to the constant company of one of Lagertha’s shieldmaidens shadowing my steps whenever I left the great hall. The women were even useful at times such as today, when I had bought more at the market than I could easily carry on my own. Lagertha took my role as hostage at Kattegat much more seriously than Aslaug had. Especially once Ivar had returned from England. “I think it is terrible, what Aslaug was doing with you,” Lagertha had told me when she took over my custody, “giving you to her monstrous son. I will keep you safe until your father returns with my Bjorn.”

I had not seen Ivar since the English boat had arrived to return him; I was allowed to watch only from a distance as his brothers pulled him onto the docks looking mostly dead. I should have been thankful at least that Lagertha had not killed them all immediately to secure her coup. She allowed the boys to live outside the town, in a cabin belonging to their father, but she refused to allow me to visit them. Not even to offer my condolences for the deaths of both their parents.

The first emotion that spread through my chest when I saw Ivar crawling up one of the lanes leading into the market was relief. He looked physically recovered from his journey, at least. His face, however, was empty and brooding. He had not seen me yet. Compassion and hope and a fierce joy swirled through me next, compelling my feet to run to him. I knew the guards Lagertha kept on both of us would not allow us to talk for long.

He still did not look up when I reached him, was focused solely on pulling himself along amidst all the passing feet. I crouched down on my heels before him, ducked my head to make sure my face was in his view. “Ivar,” I sighed, reaching out to him.

His grief-stricken eyes barely focused on me, but he stopped crawling, leaned on one elbow to lift his other arm and receive my embrace.

“Your mother, your father…” I said as I circled my arms around him, “I am so sorry.”

Ivar pulled me into him tightly, clutching me to his breast. “Sigrunn,” he sighed, as if he only just came back to himself. He pressed his cheek to mine and whispered in my ear, so intently it came out in a hiss, “Why haven’t you come to me?”

“Lagertha would not allow it.” I could already see the scowling shieldmaiden that had been shadowing Ivar striding up to us now, shaking her head at me.

“I need you, Sigrunn,” Ivar continued, voice choking on my name.

My own guard’s hand clamped down on my shoulder. “That’s enough, Princess, come along now.”

Ivar actually growled at her and clutched me harder.

“I will find a way,” I promised him, pressing a kiss into his cheek. I inhaled his sharp scent deeply, then peeled his arms off of me and stood. It was so painful to let him go this quickly, but I could not bear to give the shieldmaidens an excuse to strike him.

“It will not be this way for much longer,” Ivar called to me as I let myself be pulled away. “I will make sure of that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a wild ride, kiddos, thanks so much for coming along to the end! First off I feel that I need to say please don't be like Sigrunn. Do not ever tolerate a partner who doesn't talk with you very carefully about new and dangerous activities before you try them out. Especially when it comes to breath play. There is a way to do it safely and there are also many, many mistakes that could cause serious damage. Ivar is NOT giving a good example of healthy play here, of which the main tenets are Safe, Sane, and Consensual. 
> 
> That being said, there is a very comfortable line between reality and fantasy, and I hope you enjoyed this somewhat dramatic and overwrought fantasy. Part II will have more plot and thus the sex scenes will be less frequent; expect more time between updates but I will probably drop several chapters at once so I can keep supplying you with the good stuff. Thanks again for all of the encouragement, you truly don't know what it means to me!!!


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